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An Innovation Deficit Behind Europe’s Overall Productivity Slowdown?
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An Innovation Deficit Behind Europe’s Overall Productivity Slowdown?

Reinhilde Veugelers
Bruegel, 2017
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Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Analytical
  • Innovative
  • Background

Recommendation

Innovation is essential to the progress of an economy, but an inability to disseminate that innovation to a wider group of users who, in turn, can broaden its applications, hinders its effectiveness. According to this trenchant report from economist Reinhilde Veugelers, the rate of innovation diffusion within the European Union runs behind that of other economies. Veugelers probes systemic obstacles such as legal hurdles, inaccessible finance, and research and development that is clustered within a small group of firms, and proposes some solutions. getAbstract recommends this succinct and relevant study to entrepreneurs, executives and investors.

Take-Aways

  • One measure of innovation – research and development costs as a percentage of GDP – shows the European Union failing to keep pace with the United States, Japan, Korea or China.
  • The EU’s problem lies less in the absolute level of innovation than in how to extend its benefits throughout business and society.
  • R&D activity in Germany points to a widening innovation chasm between smaller and larger companies.

About the Author

Reinhilde Veugelers is a professor at KULeuven/MSI in Belgium and a senior fellow at Bruegel.

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