Large incumbent firms routinely acquire startups. This may stimulate aggregate growth, as acquisitions provide an incentive for startup creation and could transfer ideas to more efficient users. However, large firms do not always implement the ideas of their acquisition targets. Moreover,...

We develop a simple theoretical framework for thinking about how geographic frictions, and in particular travel costs, shape scientists' collaboration decisions and the types of projects that are developed locally versus over distance. We then take advantage of a quasi-experiment — the...

We investigate the causes and consequences of the aging of the scientific workforce. Using novel data on the population of US chemistry faculty members over fifty years, we find that the secular increase in the age of the academic workforce has been mainly driven by the slowdown in faculty...