News from the IPL
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Ottawa, 10-11 April, 2018
A number of challenge areas keep coming up in studies of Canada’s innovation ecosystem. How do we break away from the same old conversations, and actually move forward?
Instead of repeating the difficulties the 17th Annual RE$EARCH MONEY conference Breaking Through the Status Quo: Scaling Canada’s Innovation Game will shed a spotlight on innovators who are breaking new ground and overcoming old habits of thinking. From these exemplars, we will review policy implications and how we can generate more success at scale. We’ll look at:
- Successful industry-academic partnerships
- Canada’s supercluster initiative
- Government procurement
- BDC’s new Venture Capital Catalyst Initiative
- Facilitating cross-departmental collaboration
- Exemplary equity, diversity and inclusion practices
- Canadian firms who are working with educational institutions and other innovation intermediaries to prepare and fully utilize our talent
- And more!
The R$ conference is an excellent opportunity for faculty and students interested in entrepreneurship, business and innovation to hear from and network with prominent members of Canada’s innovation community.
All registrants including students get a ticket to the exclusive Dinner with the Chief Scientists on the evening of April 10th – an intimate conversation with Mona Nemer (Chief Science Advisor), Rémi Quirion (Chief Scientist, Québec) and Molly Shoichet (Chief Scientist, Ontario). Our special student rate is only $195+tax!
Don’t miss Canada’s premier innovation policy conference. Learn more and register here, or email Rebecca Melville (rebecca@impactg.com) for more information. Faculty – don’t forget to use our partner code AP2018 for a $50 discount!* *Does not apply to student rate
Editor's Pick
Data Governance in the Digital Age: The Government’s Role in Constructing the Data-Driven Economy
Blayne Haggart, CIGI
Who will set the rules and norms of this new economy is one of the biggest issues currently facing policy makers. To date, the framework of the data economy has been set primarily by those private actors for whom the control of data is most central to their existence, such as Google, Amazon and Uber. Most governments, including Canada’s, have yet to establish policy in this area, with the notable exception of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation. This essay argues that, as the main actors responsible for mediating social objectives and the conflicts of self-interested actors, governments have a fundamental role to play in constructing the data-driven economy. Drawing on political economist Karl Polanyi’s thinking about fictitious commodities, it argues that state regulation is necessary not only to promote economic prosperity, but to limit the data-driven economy’s excesses so that it does not endanger non-economic societal priorities.
Innovation Policy
Deploying AI Responsibly in Government
Michael Karlin, Policy Options
In an era of continuous social and technological change, how can an institution like the federal government stay relevant? How can public servants stay up to date on what Canadians want? How can react to issues in society at the pace that Canadians expect? Artificial intelligence (AI) is the latest tool in a suite of technologies being employed to meet the demands of an increasingly digital population. The proliferation of these technologies has provoked a growing international dialogue about the effects of advanced data analytics and AI on society and what government needs to do to adapt to this new reality. Despite this rapidly changing environment, there has been less discussion about what it means for government to deploy these tools for its own purposes. This article explores the potentials and perils of AI in government.
Solving the Productivity Puzzle
Jaana Remes, et al. McKinsey Global Institute
Nine years into recovery from the Great Recession, labor-productivity-growth rates remain near historic lows across many advanced economies. Productivity growth is crucial to increase wages and living standards, and helps raise the purchasing power of consumers to grow demand for goods and services. Therefore, slowing labor productivity growth heightens concerns at a time when aging economies depend on productivity gains to drive economic growth. Yet in an era of digitization, with technologies ranging from online marketplaces to machine learning, the disconnect between disappearing productivity growth and rapid technological change could not be more pronounced. This report sheds light on the recent slowdown in labor-productivity growth in the United States and Western Europe and outline prospects for future growth.
Clusters & Regions
SuperClusters in Canada: What’s Next?
Institute for Competitiveness and Prosperity
While the world focuses on ‘whither Amazon HQ2,’ the federal government is about to make a far more important and long-lasting decision about the future of clusters in Canada. In an attempt to address a long-standing weakness of the Canadian economy, the federal government will be announcing up to five new “superclusters” (or a series of related clusters that form a larger one). This is part of the five-year, $950 million Innovation Superclusters Initiative (ISI) that could materially impact the future of various sectors, players, and the overall competitiveness of the country. As the final list of superclusters is announced, the Institute offers recommendations to ensure that these superclusters will produce the economic growth and inclusive prosperity we hope for.
Statistics & Indicators
Useful Stats: “Eds and Meds” Employment by Metropolitan Area
SSTI Weekly Digest
The presence of Eds and Meds institutions can positively influence the levels of human capital in a region, but the need to keep costs low can hinder their overall growth. SSTI’s analysis subsequently found that employment in Eds and Meds industries increased in every state from 2005 to 2015. This article looks at Eds and Meds employment for the largest metropolitan areas in the United States. Mid-sized regions in the Northeast like Rochester, New York (4.4 percentage points), New Haven, Connecticut (2.9 percentage points), and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania (2.3 percentage points) experienced the largest growth in per-capita employment in Eds and Meds industries between 2010 and 2015.
European Commission
After years of economic and political crisis, resilient economic growth has returned to Europe, unemployment is falling and Europe is ready to set the foundations for its future. In order to solidify the recovery and ensure higher levels of prosperity, it needs to address its sluggish productivity growth, which has remained flat for almost a decade, and ensure that economic prosperity is widely shared and leads to a more cohesive society. Against this backdrop, understanding the role and economic impacts of research and innovation is crucial, as they are the main drivers of productivity and economic growth, notably for advanced economies, and affect job-creation patterns and the demand for skills as well as overall income distribution and inequality.
Policy Digest
Examining the Local Value of Economic Development Incentives: Evidence from Four U.S. Cities
Joseph Parilla and Sifan Liu, Brookings
Every year local and state governments in the United States expend tens of billions of dollars on economic development incentives. Under intense pressure to deliver economic opportunity, policymakers utilize incentives to encourage private sector firms to create jobs, invest in communities, and strengthen local industries. Drawing on a detailed literature review and a unique analysis of economic development transactions in four U.S. cities (Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Salt Lake County, and San Diego), this report advances a framework for inclusive economic development to help leaders analyze and evolve their incentive policies.
The report’s key findings include:
- Economic development incentives remain a core aspect of local and state economic development policy. This report defines economic development incentives as direct financial benefits that incentivize a firm’s opening, expansion, or retention. What distinguishes incentives from broader economic development efforts is that governments selectively provide these incentives to individual businesses, arguing that their investment or expansion would not occur but for the incentive. Estimates suggest that these policies contribute to significant public expenditures, ranging between $45 and $90 billion per year depending on the definition and estimation method.
- Incentives have come under renewed scrutiny from both academic researchers and the public. The competition between cities to land Amazon’s second corporate headquarters—along with the controversial billion-dollar incentives packages being offered—has thrust local and state economic development approaches into the public spotlight. Pressure to limit incentives for big corporate relocations has drawn on academic evidence that remains skeptical about the effectiveness of incentives, arguing that incentives do not influence business decisions to nearly the extent policymakers claim nor are they properly targeted to businesses and industries that can offer the greatest economic and social benefit.
- Cities should target incentives based on core principles of inclusive economic development. A review of local and state economic development incentives provided to firms in four U.S. cities finds that transactions align with several principles of inclusive economic development but fall short on others. Cities, regions, and states must master the global scale and technological complexity of the advanced economy and address the entrenched and exclusionary biases that prevent all workers and communities from meeting their productive potential. The report distills this dynamic into four principles toward which cities and states can align incentives. Drawing on unique transaction-level information with businesses in Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Salt Lake, and San Diego, we conducted a “census of incentives” to determine whether local and state incentive policies are aligned with these four principles: Grow from within by prioritizing firms in advanced industries that drive local comparative advantage, innovation, productivity, and wage gains; boost trade by facilitating export growth and trade with other markets in the United States and abroad in ways that deepen regional industry specializations and bring in new income and investment, invest in people and skills by incorporating workers’ skill development as a priority for economic development and employers so that improving human capacities results in meaningful work and wages; connect place by catalyzing economic place-making, and work at multiple geographic levels to connect local communities to regional jobs, housing, and opportunity.
- Economic development leaders should ensure incentives policies align with broader economic objectives, embrace public transparency and rigorous evaluation, and only target firms that advance broad-based opportunity. While not a full analysis of economic impact, these findings offer some implications for economic development incentives policy and practice. First, policymakers should ensure incentives reflect local and regional economic objectives. This census of incentives provides one guide for how cities can situate their incentives practices within four principles of inclusive economic development. Second, localities must commit to making incentives information publicly transparent, and then rigorously evaluate their impact on firm outcomes to determine what works. Finally, clearer criteria and more effective targeting should reserve incentives only for those firms that will advance broad-based opportunity, either by incentivizing opportunity-rich firms and industries, incentivizing firms to provide workers more opportunity, or by addressing place-based disparities in opportunity.
Events
Legacies of the Megacity: Toronto’s Amalgamation 20 Years Later
Toronto, 27 March, 2018
In 1998, Metropolitan Toronto and its six lower tier municipalities were amalgamated to form the City of Toronto. The decision to amalgamate was controversial then, and continues to be contentious to some today. Two decades later, what can we say about the megacity merger? Did it achieve its goals? Are Torontonians better served by one large government than the previous two-tier model? Looking forward, what lies ahead for regional governance in the GTHA? On March 27, join Institute on Municipal Finance and Governance for a panel bringing together two prominent voices involved in Toronto’s amalgamation and subsequent reorganization, and two next generation academics to discuss the opportunities for the Greater Toronto region in the decades to come.
Ottawa, 10-11 April, 2018
A number of challenge areas keep coming up in studies of Canada’s innovation ecosystem. How do we break away from the same old conversations, and actually move forward?
Instead of repeating the difficulties the 17th Annual RE$EARCH MONEY conference Breaking Through the Status Quo: Scaling Canada’s Innovation Game will shed a spotlight on innovators who are breaking new ground and overcoming old habits of thinking. From these exemplars, we will review policy implications and how we can generate more success at scale. We’ll look at:
- Successful industry-academic partnerships
- Canada’s supercluster initiative
- Government procurement
- BDC’s new Venture Capital Catalyst Initiative
- Facilitating cross-departmental collaboration
- Exemplary equity, diversity and inclusion practices
- Canadian firms who are working with educational institutions and other innovation intermediaries to prepare and fully utilize our talent
- And more!
The R$ conference is an excellent opportunity for faculty and students interested in entrepreneurship, business and innovation to hear from and network with prominent members of Canada’s innovation community.
The 12th Workshop on the Organization, Economics, and Policy of Scientific Research
Bath, UK, 27-28 April, 2018
As in previous years the aim of the workshop is to bring together a small group of scholars interested in the analysis of the production and diffusion of scientific research from an economics, historical, organizational, and policy perspective. We aim to attract contributions from both junior and senior scholars; a minimum number of slots are reserved for junior researchers (PhD students or postdoc scholars who obtained their PhD in 2015 or later).
8th Competition and Innovation Summer School (CISS)
Ulcinj, Montenegro ,28 May – 2 June, 2018
This workshop offers young interested researchers within the fields of the economics of innovation and competition the possibility to intensively discuss their dissertation plans or drafts within a peer group of experienced and renowned scholars, as well as other PhD students and post-doc researchers in a great environment.
CISS offers lectures and workshops on:
- topics of innovation,
- the economics of science and intellectual property rights,
- empirical competition analysis, and
- contemporary issues surrounding theories of industrial organization.
5G and Broadband Connectivity for All
Durban, South Africa, 31 May – 1 June, 2018
WWRF and CSIR are partnering to organize the wireless world research forum meeting WWRF40 in Durban, South Africa. The theme for the research Forum meeting is: 5G and Broadband Connectivity for All. The Organizers therefore invite academics, researchers and industrial representatives to share information and present results on Future Wireless Communication Systems, Networks and Services and to discuss critical business and regulatory aspects, advanced technology findings that will impact the deployment of 5G and enabling broadband connectivity for All. Technical papers describing recent research results and disruptive innovations in technologies, regulatory positions and business models are solicited. Contributions focusing on the WWRF 40th meeting theme 5G and Broadband Connectivity for All, particularly within the areas of WWRF’s existing Vertical Industry Platforms (VIPs) and Working Groups (WG) are welcome.
A World of Flows – Labour Mobility, Capital, and Knowledge in an Age of Global Reversal and Revival
Lugano, Switzerland, 3-6 June, 2018
The 2018 RSA Annual Conference aims to address processes of global reversal and regional revival, in a world dominated by flows of capital, labor, and knowledge. Further it seeks to understand the political, economic and social factors that initiate change and how these changes are finding new expressions as the world’s political and economic system continues to struggle with low rates of global economic growth, the rise of China as an economic super power, the on-going impacts of recession and austerity, and increasing levels of inequality. To study and debate these and many other questions, we warmly invite the regional studies/science and connected communities to join us.
Manchester, UK, 5-8 September, 2018
Across the world, states and city regions are facing huge societal, economic, environmental, and political challenges whose solutions require concerted new efforts and innovative partnerships. The 2018 International Triple Helix Conference brings together academia, government, business, and community to share effective practices and to advance the frontiers of knowledge about collaboration for economic progress, social development and sustainability, and the role of cities and regions as enabling spaces for these interactions.
Brussels, Belgium, 7-11 October, 2018
As part of the 16th European Week of Regions and Cities (EWRC), the biggest event worldwide on regional and urban development, the Master Class on EU Cohesion Policy will be held for PhD students and early-career researchers for the sixth time. Applications are being sought from PhD students and early career researchers (defined as being within five years of the date on their PhD certificate or equivalent) undertaking research related to European Cohesion Policy to attend the 2018 University Master Class. The Master Class is a unique format to connect aspiring researchers and will include presentations of papers by the participants as well as lectures and panel debates with policymakers, EU officials and senior academics to improve understanding of, and research, on EU Cohesion Policy. In particular, the Master Class will serve to
- discuss recent research on European regional and urban development and EU Cohesion Policy;
- enable PhD students and early career researchers to exchange views and network with policymakers, EU officials and senior academics;
- raise awareness and understanding of the research potential in the field of EU Cohesion Policy.
The Master Class is organised and led by the European Commission, DG for Regional and Urban Policy (DG REGIO), the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) and the Regional Studies Association (RSA) in cooperation with the European Regional Science Association (ERSA) and the Association of European Schools of Planning (AESOP).
TCI 2018 – Unexpected Connections: Collaborating to Compete – Clusters in Action
Toronto, 16-18 October, 2018
Cluster success is often the result of collaboration, more than just the agglomeration of anchor firms, R&D labs, incubators and accelerators, and disrupting organizations. Regions with clusters that actively collaborate within and between one another are more competitive. As firms continue to face new challenges from technological, economic, and political shifts, clusters remain a driving catalyst that can create sustainable levels of innovation and economic growth. Firms, at the heart of active clusters, with the support of those within the cluster ecosystem, can weather the changing dynamics of the global marketplace. TCI 2018 explores the collaboration that is happening within clusters and the opportunities to work together towards shared prosperity.
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This newsletter is prepared by Jen Nelles.
Project manager is David A. Wolfe.