Polina Karpaty

PhD candidate in Economics, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, Sweden

Affiliated Researcher, Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN), Stockholm, Sweden

On the job market 2022 -- 2023

Research interests

Environmental economics
Clean innovations
International trade

CV

The most recent CV can be found here

Contact

E-mail: polina.karpaty@slu.se

Working Papers

Import competition and environmental innovation: Evidence from the renewable energy sector in the EU JMP!

For most developed countries, innovation is a way to secure sustainable long-run productivity growth, especially in the energy sector. In the European Union, the growth in patenting in the renewable energy (RE) sector -- hydro, geothermal, solar PV, solar thermal, and wind power -- was more than tenfold faster than in manufacturing between 2005 and 2017. At the same time, the dependence on China as the leading supplier of core products used in the RE sector increased, too. Using rich data on patents as a measure of innovation for the EU and a control function approach as an identification strategy, I examine how a rapid expansion of China affects European RE innovators -- the level of patenting and technological entry rate. I show that firms that faced higher competition with imports from China experienced a substantial decline in patenting, and the adverse effect is larger for firms that patent more frequently. Furthermore, growth in Chinese import competition prevents new innovators from entering the RE innovation market and reduces the likelihood of applying for a patent. The study adds to our understanding of the determinants of environmental innovation by examining the role of international trade.

Who's doing clean tech innovation: Evidence from Sweden

with Shon Ferguson, Pehr-Johan Norbäck & Lars Persson

Using historical data on patents and firm-level characteristics, we provide a set of stylized facts about how clean technology innovation correlates with firm size, firm age, ownership, and industry characteristics. We find that patents in clean technologies by Swedish firms tend to be dominated by larger and more established firms compared to other types of patents. We also find that clean tech patents are more concentrated in a small number of firms compared to other types of patents. We propose an oligopoly-emission model that can explain this result. In the model, the underlying mechanism is that emission-intensive incumbents not only benefit from a better competitive position with the climate-smart invention but also suffer more absent a climate-smart invention when emission taxes increase.

Publications

Ustyuzhanina, P. Decomposition of air pollution emissions from Swedish manufacturing. Environ Econ Policy Stud 24, 195–223 (2022). [open access]

Work in progress

"Outward FDI and Home Country Exports of Goods and Services" with Patrik Karpaty

"The role of managers on ESG performance" with Roberto Rigobon and Aggregate Confusion Project