Page 5 - IDEA Studie 17 2016 Prime dotace a soukrome vydaje na VaV

Study 17 / 2016
Do Direct Subsidies Promote Private R&D Expenditure? Evidence from
Regression Discontinuity Design2 NOVEMBER 2016
JÁN PALGUTA and MARTIN SRHOLEC
Summary
• Direct government subsidies for research and development (R&D) are a primary innovation policy tool in the Czech Republic. Although there are strong theoretical arguments in favour of R&D subsidies for business enterprises, it is also important to carry out credible evaluations of their real impact. Subsidy programmes can be considered successful if they stimulate additional R&D expenditure in the private sector.
• The aim of this study is to illustrate the evaluation of direct subsidies for business R&D expenditures using a regression discontinuity approach. We use data from the 3rd call for proposals in the ALFA programme of the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic. Our analysis compares the growth rates of private R&D expenditures of subsidized and unsubsidized firms that ranked close to the threshold above subsidies were awarded.
• The results indicate that government subsidies have a positive impact on private R&D expenditure. Private R&D spending grew faster in subsidized firms just above the ranking threshold compared to unsubsidized firms just below the threshold, even though there was no difference in their spending growth before the subsidies were received.
2 This study received support from the research programme Strategy AV21 of the Czech Academy of Sciences. We would like to thank Daniel Münich for his precious comments. Any inaccuracies, omissions or errors are
however down to the autohors.
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