The impact of technology-push and demand-pull policies on technical change - Does the locus of policies matter?

How to foster technical change is a highly relevant and intricate question in the arena of policymaking. Various studies have shown that technology-push and demand-pull policies induce innovation. However, there is a lack of work that distinguishes between the loci of policy support when assessing the policy-innovation relationship. We address this gap by shedding light on the question how the innovation effects of domestic and foreign demand-pull and technology-push policies differ. Using solar photovoltaic modules as a research case we conduct a panel analysis on 15 OECD countries over the period 1978 through 2005 with patent data. Three key findings emerged: First, our analyses find no evidence that domestic technology-push policies foster innovative output outside of national borders. Second, both domestic and foreign demand-pull policies trigger innovative output in a country. Third, we detect no indication that market growth induced by domestic demand-pull policies leads to more national innovative output than market growth induced by foreign demand-pull policies. Consequently, demand-pull policies create significant country-level innovation spillovers, which could disincentivize national policymakers to engage in domestic market creation. Based on these findings we discuss the need to establish supranational demand-pull policy schemes in order to address the spillover issue.     

塔克拉玛干沙漠腹地太阳紫外辐射特征

本文利用塔克拉玛干沙漠腹地(塔中站:83°40'E,39°01'N)2007年1月-12月紫外辐射和总辐射的观测资料,分析了塔克拉玛干沙漠腹地太阳紫外辐射的气候学特征。结果表明:①本地区太阳紫外辐射年总量为305.64MJ(/m2·a)。年平均日总量为0.84MJ/m2,大于黑河、太湖和青藏高原地区。紫外辐射年平均值在总辐射年平均值中所占比例为4.99%,小于太湖和北京,大于黑河地区和五道梁,月平均日总量7月最大;②其日变化,晴天呈现出标准的倒"U"型,即早晚小、中午大,正午达到一天中的最大值;③紫外辐射受云量、降水和沙尘的影响很大;④紫外辐射在总辐射中所占比例有明显的年、季节和日变化,其年变化分为三个明显不同的阶段,夏季大,冬季小。青藏高原地区春夏大,冬季小,北京地区和黑河地区相近,分别是冬季大,夏季小和冬季大,春夏小。