A calculation of the social returns to innovation /Benjamin F. Jones and Lawrence H. Summers --Innovation and human capital policy /John Van Reenen --Immigration policy levers for US innovation and start-ups /Sari Pekkala Kerr and William R. Kerr --Scientific grant funding /Pierre Azoulay and Danielle Li --Tax policy for innovation /Bronwyn H. Hall --Taxation and innovation: what do we know? /Ufuk Akcigit and Stefanie Stantcheva --Government incentives for entrepreneurship /Josh Lerner.

This study defines the aims and tools of a new innovation policy and identifies examples of good policy practice recently implemented in OECD countries.

'The book is quite valuable, with its broad international coverage of state activities in the area of research and innovation support. It should also foster serious debates on the balance between public and private efforts in research and innovation.' - Mats Benner, Journal of Economic Literature '. . . this book provides the reader with a valuable summary of national public policy approaches to research and innovation at the end of the twentieth century and is a useful addition to the shelves of industrial policy experts.' - David Gray, Entrepreneurship and Innovation The book analyses the evolution of research and innovation policies in the world's leading countries. The last decade has witnessed a radical transformation of the landscape shaped after World War II, as described in the seminal collection edited by Richard Nelson in the early 1990s. Even though national systems have inherited different institutional arrangements and trajectories, analyses show three major converging trends in their public policies. There has been a retraction from support to large firms and programmes and a shift toward small to medium enterprises and the innovation infrastructure; the focus on public research and training capabilities is growing; and there has been a redesign of public intervention with the growing role of regions and states on one hand and multinational authorities on the other, particularly in the European Union.

Promoting innovation requires innovative government policy. Innovation through the creation, diffusion and use of knowledge has become a key driver of economic growth and provides part of the response to many new societal challenges. However, the determinants of innovation performance have changed in a globalising, knowledge-based economy. Government policy to boost innovation performance must be adapted accordingly, based on a sound conceptual framework. Synthesising the results of a multi-year OECD project on national innovation systems (NIS), this publication demonstrates how the NIS approach can be implemented in designing and implementing more efficient technology and innovation policies. Further reading Innovative Clusters: Drivers of National Innovation Systems. Innovative People: Mobility of Skilled Personnel in National Innovation Systems. Innovative Networks: Co-operation in National Innovation Systems.

Policies to stimulate innovation at national and local levels must both build on and contribute to the dynamics of innovative clusters. This book presents a series of papers written by policy makers and academic experts in the field, that demonstrate why and how this can be done.

This volume analyzes the impact of public policy on the knowledge economies and higher education systems of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, including Australia, Canada, Japan, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States, as well as the overall European Union. Given that innovation is a national economy’s most valuable asset in today’s global marketplace, countries are investing more than ever in academic research, doctoral education, and the process of knowledge transfer. Policymakers now perceive the academic enterprise as a means of sustaining international competitiveness, and newly implemented national innovation policies represent a marked shift away from traditional science and technology policies. The contributors examine this new relationship between higher education and national systems of innovation, posing important questions: How is public policy affecting academic research? How are postsecondary institutions responding? The book concludes with a careful assessment of the effectiveness of current national innovation policy on higher education systems. Bolstered by the latest economic research on higher education, this book will be read by researchers and policymakers worldwide.

Increasingly, researchers and policymakers alike recognize that innovations are generated by complex and dynamic national ecosystems that include government, industry, universities and schools.