The missing link: knowledge diffusion and entrepreneurship in endogenous growth

By P. Braunerhjelm, Zoltan J. Acs, David B. Audretsch, B. Carlsson. 2010

543 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The intellectual breakthrough contributed by the new growth theory was the recognition that investments in knowledge and human capital endogenously generate economic growth through the spillover of knowledge. However, endogenous growth theory does not explain how or why spillovers occur. This paper presents a model that shows how growth depends on knowledge accumulation and its diffusion through both incumbents and entrepreneurial activities. We claim that entrepreneurs are one missing link in converting knowledge into economically relevant knowledge. Implementing different regression techniques for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries during 1981 to 2002 provides surprisingly robust evidence that primarily entrepreneurs contributed to growth and that the importance of entrepreneurs increased in the 1990s. A Granger test confirms that causality goes in the direction from entrepreneurs to growth. The results indicate that policies facilitating entrepreneurship are an important tool to enhance knowledge diffusion and promote economic growth.

Subfields: Economics and Econometrics, Information Systems, Management of Technology and Innovation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/1e2804b2936481bf2f93d0fe9abee6297d2f42e0

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Citations in the corpus

Knowledge-Based Regional Economic Development: A Synthetic Review of Knowledge Spillovers, Entrepreneurship, and Entrepreneurial Ecosystems (2018, background): “As noted, there is a missing link in EGT between knowledge and economic growth through innovative activity (Braunerhjelm et al., 2010).”
What turns knowledge into innovative products? The role of entrepreneurship and knowledge spillovers (2009, unknown): “The entrepreneur is the “missing link in converting knowledge into economically relevant knowledge” (Braunerhjelm et al. 2010, p. 105).”
Entrepreneurship, innovation and regional growth: a network theory (2015, background): “their firms convert available knowledge into economic knowledge (Braunerhjelm et al. 2010) and by doing so”
Is entrepreneurship necessarily good? Microeconomic evidence from developed and developing countries (2013, background): “In particular, entrepreneurs, through their new companies, would be able to exploit the opportunities provided by new knowledge and ideas that are not fully understood and commercialized by the mature incumbent firms (Acs et al., 2005, 2012; Audretsch et al., 2006; Carree and Thurik, 2006; Braunerhj”
Growth and entrepreneurship (2011, unknown): “Because it facilitates knowledge spillovers, entrepreneurship is expected to be positively associated with economic growth (Audretsch and Keilbach 2007; Braunerhjelm et al. 2010).”
Entrepreneurship, institutional economics, and economic growth: an ecosystem perspective (2018, unknown): “This leads us to consider whether entrepreneurship and institutions, in combination as an ecosystem, might represent the “missing link” in explaining cross-country differences in economic growth (Braunerhjelm et al. 2010; Acs et al. 2017; Sussan and Acs 2017).”
An absorptive capacity theory of knowledge spillover entrepreneurship (2011, background): “Similarly, Braunerhjelm et al. (2010) have found a positive effect of knowledge spillover entrepreneurship on economic growth after controlling for R&D activity.”
The rise of the entrepreneurial economy and the future of dynamic capitalism (2013, background): “Therefore, entrepreneurship is not only exogenously driven by individual characteristics, but it is also driven by the endogenous response to opportunities created by the context (Audretsch, 2007a; Acs et al., 2009; Acs et al., 2010).”
Regional systems of entrepreneurship: the nexus of human capital, knowledge and new firm formation (2013, background): “As Braunerhjelm et al. (2010) and Michelacci (2002) have argued, R&D or knowledge production may not lead to innovations and economic growth if new knowledge cannot be commercialized.”
The value of an educated population for an individual's entrepreneurship success (2014, unknown): “Entrepreneurship may very well be one of the main channels through which new economic knowledge can be commercialized (Parker, 2009, p. 74; Block et al., 2009, Braunerhjelm et al., 2010).”
Who is the academic entrepreneur? The role of graduate students in the development of university spinoffs (2016, background): “A firm-level focus neglects the role of individual entrepreneurs such as faculty and students, a challenge observed within the broader entrepreneurship literature (Acs et al. 2009; Bradley et al. 2013a; Braunerhjelm et al. 2010; Link et al. 2014).”
High-growth firms and innovation: an empirical analysis for Spanish firms (2014, result): “This is in line with Braunerhjelm et al. (2010), among others, who remark that entrepreneurship is the missing link in endogenous growth analysis, the generation of knowledge at firm level and aggregate perspective.”