Cycles in basic innovations

Basic innovations are often believed to be the drivers of economic growth. It has been widely documented that economic growth follows cyclical patterns of varying length. In this paper we examine if such patterns are also present in basic innovations. For an annual time series of count data covering 1764-1976, we fit a harmonic Poisson regression model. The results suggest the presence of multiple cycles of length 5, 13, 24, 34 and 61. We compare these cycles and their joint effect with widely documented economic cycles and find important resemblances and differences.