Working Paper: NBER ID: w14851
Authors: Philippe Aghion; Mathias Dewatripont; Caroline M. Hoxby; Andreu Mascolell; Andr Sapir
Abstract: We investigate how university governance affects research output, measured by patenting and international university research rankings. For both European and U.S. universities, we generate several measures of autonomy, governance, and competition for research funding. We show that university autonomy and competition are positively correlated with university output, both among European countries and among U.S. public universities. We then identity a (political) source of exogenous shocks to funding of U.S. universities. We demonstrate that, when a state's universities receive a positive funding shock, they produce more patents if they are more autonomous and face more competition from private research universities. Finally, we show that during periods when merit-based competitions for federal research funding have been most prominent, universities produce more patents when they receive an exogenous funding shock, suggesting that routine participation in such competitions hones research skill.
Keywords: University Governance; Research Output; Patenting; Competition; Autonomy
JEL Codes: H0; H52; I2; I23; I28; O3
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| university autonomy and competition (D29) | research output (O36) |
| positive funding shocks (F32) | patenting (O34) |
| university autonomy (I23) | patenting (O34) |
| competition from private institutions (L33) | patenting (O34) |
| heightened merit-based competition for federal research funding (I23) | research productivity (O47) |
| variation in funding (I22) | increased patenting (O34) |