The Review of Economics and Statistics· 2016Q1
Culture, Institutions, and the Wealth of Nations
- 643citations
- Q1SCImago
- 2016year
Short summary
Individualist cultures drive innovation and economic growth by leveraging social status rewards for innovators, independent of institutional factors.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Key points
- Individualist cultures increase innovation and economic growth.
- Social status rewards for innovation are a key mechanism.
- Instrumental variables (genes, blood types, pathogens) support the individualism-growth link.
- The relationship holds independently of institutional factors.
- Culture and institutions exhibit two-way causality.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
We argue that a more individualist culture leads to more innovation and to higher growth because of the social status rewards associated with innovation in that culture. We use data on the frequency of particular genes associated with collectivist cultures, as well as a measure of distance in terms of frequencies of blood types, and historic prevalence of pathogens to instrument individualism scores. The relationship between individualism and innovation/growth remains strong even after controlling for institutions and other potentially confounding factors. We also provide evidence consistent with two-way causality between culture and institutions.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. The Review of Economics and Statistics, 2016 · DOI ↗
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Field: Demography
DemographySocial Sciences