The long-run effects of R&D place-based policies: evidence from Russian science cities

By Helena Schweiger

During the technological and military competition of the Cold War, the Soviet government created “science cities” – urban centres that hosted a high concentration of research and development facilities. But what has been the long-term effect of these cities? This paper finds that in today’s Russia, science cities still – among other things – host a more educated population, are more economically developed and employ a larger number of workers in R&D and ICT than other localities that were comparable to science cities at the time of their inception. We also evaluate whether the effects of science cities spill over onto other firms located nearby, and to what economic and geographical extent.