Worker mobility across firms can enhance innovation by spreading knowledge, but such mobility may also hinder … innovation by making firms reluctant to invest in R&D. A common way that firms limit workers' mobility is with noncompete … agreements (NCAs). We examine how the legal enforceability of NCAs affects innovation, as measured by patenting, using data on …

The correlation between productivity and competition is an oft-observed but ill-understood result. Some suggest that … there is a treatment effect of competition on measured productivity, e.g. through a reduction of managerial slack. Others … argue that greater competition makes unproductive establishments exit by reallocating demand to their productive rivals …

establish a relational contract that softens price competition to either strengthen the inefficient firm in a war of attrition …

statutes that are more effective at preventing outsiders' entry and at mitigating price competition lead to less patenting. We … strongly restrict entry and price competition. We show that guilds that originated from medieval religious confraternities were … more likely to regulate entry and competition, and that the effect on patenting is robust to instrumenting guild statutes …

effects are due to increased competition for local resources …