Stefano Magrini (p), Margherita Gerolimetto, Alessandro Spiganti

Francesca Rubiconto

In the last decades, the geography of innovation activity became much more concentrated. By focusing on the US metropolitan statistical area of residence of the inventors of patents filed to the United States Patents and Trademark Office between 1990 and 2016, we show that this is increasingly true also for “green” innovation, i.e. patents covering mitigation or adaptation to climate change. We find a sharp increase in concentration across areas after the beginning of the 2000s, with areas that are generally more innovative also producing more green patents. Focusing on the relationship between green innovation and urban density, we find evidence of a positive significant relationship only after 2002. To shed some light on this puzzling outcome, we further qualified the concept of density to urban human capital density, finding the expected significant relationship between green innovation and density before and after 2002, and we aim at possibly rationalizing these findings.

Francesca Rubiconto (p), Bart Verspagen

Michael Stuetzer

Environmental innovation offers the potential to reduce emissions while fostering income and employment, particularly in regions highly vulnerable to climate impacts. This paper investigates whether environmental innovation can address the structural challenges of Southern European economies such as slowing demand, persistent unemployment and climate vulnerability. While previous literature has explored the relation between environmental innovation, competitiveness, and employment, findings remain ambiguous and often conflicting. The main challenge arises from indirect demand effects, differences between types of innovation, and regional socioeconomic structures that can influence these interactions and shape innovation outcomes. By bridging the broader literature on innovation with the emerging studies on the economic effects of environmental innovation in the specific regional context, this paper provides policy recommendations and new research directions on the nexus between innovation, competitiveness and employment in climate-vulnerable regions.

Michael Stuetzer (p), Abel Brodeur, Martin Obschonka, David Audretsch, Jason Rentfrow, Jeff Potter, Sam Gosling

Stefano Magrini

Entrepreneurial culture is a critical focus of research and policy. While the extant literature often treats it as exogenous, we propose a theory of endogenous entrepreneurial culture to explain the evolution of regional entrepreneurship and its underlying culture. We apply this model to the U.S. gold rush in the 19th century as a natural experiment. Using causal methods, we find empirical evidence for persistent high entrepreneurship rates in the gold rush counties over time. Regarding the mechanisms underlying this persistence, we find empirical evidence for selective migration of entrepreneurially minded people to the gold rush counties over a period of 100 years. The entrepreneurial culture in the gold rush counties additionally induced migrants to the gold rush to become more entrepreneurial. Lastly, we also find some evidence that of pro-entrepreneurship institutions in the states influenced by the gold rush positively affected entrepreneurship.