Achieving "appropriate" levels of investment in technological change: what have we learned?
ResearchPublished 1977
ResearchPublished 1977
In 1971 the National Science Foundation (NSF) sponsored a colloquium to explore the relationships between R&D spending and productivity, and to examine the case for government intervention to increase the level of such R&D spending. The present paper examines the progress made in finding answers. The primary conclusion is that answers have not been found. One of the principal indicators of progress cited is our growing realization that it was naive to expect that they would be. It is suggested that the focus of NSF research support should shift from the narrow concern reflected in the topics mentioned above to the broader issue of corporate decisionmaking and factors influencing it. The final section outlines a program of research aimed at examining the longer-term consequences--including the consequences for innovative performance--that may result from the recent transformation of the bulk of U.S. industry from "unregulated" to "regulated."
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