Research, Innovation and Productivity: an Econometric Analysis at the Firm Level.

This paper studies the link between productivity, innovation and research at the firm level. We introduce three new features: (i) A structural model that explains productivity by innovation output, and innovation output by research investment; (ii) New data on French manufacturing firms, including the number of European patents and the percentage share of innovative sales, as well as firm-level demand pull and technology push indicators; (iii) Econometric methods which correct for selectivity and simultaneity biases ans take into account the statistical features of the available data: only a small proportion of firms engage in research activities and/or apply for patents; productivity, innovation and research are endogenously determined; research investment and capital are truncated variables, patents are count data and innovative sales are interval data.