The heterogenous relationship between migration and innovation: Evidence from Italy

Abstract

This paper offers a novel take on the relationship between migration and regional innovation by analysing the impact of both international and internal migration flows across Italian provinces, by skill level, and on three types of intellectual property rights (IPRs), namely patents, trademarks and design rights. Allowing us to capture innovation beyond technology and high-tech manufacturing, our results shed light on the relationship between different types of migrant human capital and this array of innovative outcomes. Focusing on Italian provinces in the period 2003–2012, our empirical analysis reveals that internal migration is more significantly related to innovation than international migration. Moreover, medium- and high-skilled migrants are positively associated with all three types of IPRs, while low-skilled migration has a negative association. There are also significant differences across provinces, with a clear distinction between the more economically developed Northern provinces and the rest of Italy.