Şerife Koç, Ramazan Uctu, Hassan Essop, Birol Mercan
The theoretical and empirical evidence that innovation activities positively affect the economic performance of countries is overwhelming. However, since innovation rates vary across countries, the positive impact of innovation activities also varies across countries. As a result, it is crucial to identify the key factors that promote innovation. This paper aims to investigate the impact of innovation on economic growth for the period 2009–2021 in 22 economies, employing the two-stage least squares method (2SLS), as well as the One-Step SGMM and Two-Step SGMM estimators. The analysis used GDP per capita as the dependent variable, and early-stage entrepreneurship rate, mean years of education, R&D expenditures, and trade freedom as independent variables. According to the results obtained from the analysis, the mean years of education, R&D expenditures and trade freedom have positive effects on economic growth. The effect of early-stage entrepreneurship on economic growth is statistically significant and negative.