Migration and invention in the Age of Mass Migration

DIodato, Dario, Morrison, Andrea and Petralia, Sergio (2022) Migration and invention in the Age of Mass Migration. Journal of Economic Geography, 22 (2). 477 - 498. ISSN 1468-2702

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Abstract

More than 30 million people migrated to the USA between late-ninetieth and early-twentieth century, and thousands became inventors. Drawing on a novel dataset of immigrant inventors in the USA, we assess the city-level impact of immigrants' patenting and their contribution to the technological specialization of the receiving US regions between 1870 and 1940. Our results show that native inventors benefited from the inventive activity of immigrants. In addition, we show that the knowledge transferred by immigrants gave rise to new and previously not exiting technological fields in the US regions where immigrants moved to.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2021 The Authors
Divisions:	Geography & Environment
Subjects:	J Political Science > JV Colonies and colonization. Emigration and immigration. International migration H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions
JEL classification:	F - International Economics > F2 - International Factor Movements and International Business > F22 - International Migration O - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth > O3 - Technological Change; Research and Development > O31 - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives R - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics > R3 - Production Analysis and Firm Location > R30 - General J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J6 - Mobility, Unemployment, and Vacancies > J61 - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
Date Deposited:	22 Apr 2022 10:48
Last Modified:	17 Apr 2024 21:36
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/114920

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