{"product_id":"economic-analysis-of-product-innovation-9780674225404","title":"Economic Analysis of Product Innovation","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOne of the most striking features of contemporary industrial economies is their ability to offer an ever-expanding and improving range of products. Personal computers, tiny pacemakers, digital watches, and VCRs simply did not exist, and were not even dreamt of, only a few decades ago. Such product innovations play an increasingly important role in modern economic growth, and it is therefore imperative that economists come to grips with them, just as they have done with traditional economic phenomena.   In this skillfully crafted and imaginative study, Manuel Trajtenberg develops the tools to quantify and analyze the notion of product innovation. He argues persuasively that the magnitude of an innovation should be equated with the social benefits that it generates. Drawing from the characteristics approach to demand theory and the econometrics of discrete choice, he presents an ingenious method to estimate the benefits from product innovations that accrue to the consumer over time. His method centers on consumer preferences for different product attributes -such as speed and size of memory in computers-and then uses those preferences to evaluate the changes in attributes.   Trajtenberg applies his approach to the study of one of the most remarkable innovations in medical technology--Computed Tomography (CT) scanners. He assembled for that purpose an impressive set of data on every aspect of the new technology, from qualities and prices, patents and research, to details on virtually every sale in the United States during the decade following the introduction of CT in 1973. This close-up view of an innovation, quite rare in economic literature, offers valuable insights on the nature of the innovative process, the interaction between innovation and diffusion, the effects of uncertainty about quality, and the implications of changing preferences.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIntroduction   The Measurement of Innovations   The Magnitude of Innovations  A Method for Measuring Innovations  The Formal Derivation of the Surplus Function  The Construction of Quality-Adjusted Price Indices on the Basis of DELTAW  ADELTAW-Based Indices versus Hedonic Prices  The Decomposition of W( ) and the \"Taste for Horizontal Variety\"   The Case of CT Scanners   The Ongoing Revolution in Diagnostic Technologies  The Story of CT Scanners  Diffusion and Regulation  Technical Aspects  Data and Sources  The Impact of Regulation on the Diffusion of CT Scanners  Determinants of the Adoption Time of CT for Individual Hospitals  The Assessment of Image Quality  Data on CT Scanners   The Choice of CT Scanners and the Dynamics of Preferences   Specification issues  Estimating the Hedonic Price Functions  The Estimation of the MNL  Head versus Body Scanners  The Nested Multinomial Logit Model  Changes in Preferences and Inducement Mechanisms  Derivation of Cross Elasticities in the Nested MNL  Surveys of Users of CT Scanners   Gains from Innovation in CT   Preliminary Issues in Computing the Gains  Incremental Gains from Innovation  Total Gains and the Interdependency of Innovation and Dffusion  R\u0026amp;D Expenditures and Social Returns  The Time Profile of Benefits and Costs  The Construction of Real Price Indices  Sources of Data on R\u0026amp;D Expenditures on CT   Patents as Indicators of Innovation   The Value of Patents  Using Patent Data  Patents in Computed Tomography  The Statistical Evidence  The Patents-R\u0026amp;D-Patents Connection and Other Extensions  The Usefulness of Patent Data  Online Search and Retrieval of Patent Data from Large Databases  A Statistical Analysis of Truncation and Age Effects   References   Index","brand":"Harvard University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49403562131799,"sku":"9780674225404","price":43.31,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780674225404.jpg?v=1730483834","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/economic-analysis-of-product-innovation-9780674225404","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}