This paper develops an occupation-level measure of Capital-Embodied Innovation (CEI) by matching patents with capital goods based on their text similarity. The impact of CEI on labor demand is heterogeneous, depending on the similarity between capital and occupational tasks. Specifically, CEI...

We quantify the contribution of the largest firms to South Korea's economic performance over the period 1972-2011. Using firm-level historical data, we document a novel fact: firm concentration rose substantially during the growth miracle period. To understand whether rising concentration...

Should governments subsidize firms' own innovation or adoption of foreign technology? How does the answer change over different stages of development? To answer these questions, we digitize the universe of technology transfer contracts between domestic and foreign firms in South Korea during its...

This paper develops an occupation-level measure of Capital-Embodied Innovation (CEI) by matching patents with capital goods based on their text similarity. The impact of CEI on labor demand is heterogeneous, depending on the similarity between capital and occupational tasks. Specifically, CEI...

We study how one-time subsidies for adoption of modern technology drove Korea's industrialization in the 1970s. Leveraging unique historical data, we provide causal evidence consistent with coordination failures: adoption improved adopters' performance and generated local spillovers, with firms...

Should policymakers in developing countries prioritize foreign technology adoption over domestic innovation? How might this depend on development stages? Using historical technology transfer data from Korea, we find that greater productivity gaps with foreign firms correlate with faster...

This paper measures innovation on tools used by different occupations and studies its impact on the increasing skill premium. First, we match the description of tools from Wikipedia with patent text data using textual analysis to measure the innovation on tools. Then, we study its relation with...

We study how the adoption of foreign technology and local spillovers from such adoption contributed to late industrialization in a developing country during the postwar period. Using novel historical firm-level data for South Korea, we provide three empirical findings: direct productivity gains...