Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • 2017
  • Working Paper
  • HBS Working Paper Series

The Rise of American Ingenuity: Innovation and Inventors of the Golden Age

By: Ufuk Akcigit, John Grigsby and Tom Nicholas
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:73
ShareBar

Abstract

We examine the golden age of U.S. innovation by undertaking a major data collection exercise linking inventors from historical U.S. patents to Federal Censuses between 1880 and 1940 and to regional economic aggregates. We provide a theoretical framework to motivate the micro- and macro-level stylized facts we uncover in the data. We show that inventors were highly educated and that father’s income and education were important intergenerational transmission channels. Inventors tended to migrate to places that were conducive to innovation, and they were positively selected through exit early in their careers. New inventors received more patent citations than incumbent inventors, suggesting a cycle of creative destruction. The financial returns to technological development were high. At the macro level we identify a strong relationship between patented inventions and long-run economic growth and use an instrumental variables approach exploiting an historical shift in innovation activity during World War II to show that this relationship could be causal. Finally, we document a U-shaped relationship between top income inequality and innovation, yet innovative places tended to be more socially mobile. Our new data help to address important questions related to innovation and long-run growth dynamics.

Keywords

Economic Development; Patents; Economic Growth; Innovation and Invention; Demographics

Citation

Akcigit, Ufuk, John Grigsby, and Tom Nicholas. "The Rise of American Ingenuity: Innovation and Inventors of the Golden Age." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 17-063, January 2017. (Revised June 2017.)
  • Read Now

About The Author

Tom Nicholas

Entrepreneurial Management
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Human Capital and the Managerial Revolution in the United States

    By: Tom Nicholas
    • August 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Air Wars: Deregulating the U.S. Airline Industry

    By: Tom Nicholas and James Weber
    • July 2022
    • Faculty Research

    A Soul and a Service: North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance

    By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko
More from the Authors
  • Human Capital and the Managerial Revolution in the United States By: Tom Nicholas
  • Air Wars: Deregulating the U.S. Airline Industry By: Tom Nicholas and James Weber
  • A Soul and a Service: North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College