This study explores the dynamic effects of patent policy on innovation and income inequality in a Schumpeterian growth model with endogenous market structure and heterogeneous households. We find that strengthening patent protection has a positive effect on economic growth and a positive or an inverted-U effect on income inequality when the number of differentiated products is fixed in the short run. However, when the number of products adjusts endogenously, the effects of patent protection on growth and inequality become negative in the long run. We also calibrate the model to US data to perform a quantitative analysis and find that the long-run negative effect of patent policy on inequality is much larger than its short-run positive effect. This result remains consistent with our empirical finding from a panel vector autoregression.

这项研究探索了具有内生市场结构和异质家庭的熊彼特式增长模型中专利政策对创新和收入不平等的动态影响。我们发现，如果在短期内固定差异化产品的数量，那么加强专利保护将对经济增长产生积极影响，对收入不平等产生正向或倒U型影响。但是，当产品数量进行内生性调整时，专利保护对增长和不平等的影响从长远来看将变为负面。我们还根据美国数据对模型进行了校准，以进行定量分析，发现专利政策对不平等的长期负面影响远大于其短期正面影响。这一结果与我们根据面板向量自回归的经验发现保持一致。