
South Korea and Sweden are the most innovative countries in the world - starpilot
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/02/south-korea-and-sweden-are-the-most-innovative-countries-in-the-world/
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wenc
Before we (inevitably) argue from emotion whether or not the ranking tracks
our experience, it's useful to understand what metrics Bloomberg (the index
cited in the linked WEF article) includes in their definition of innovation.
From a 2015 article [1], it seems that innovation to them is defined as
follows:

"Bloomberg ranked countries and sovereigns based on their overall ability to
innovate and identified the top 50. Six equally weighted metrics were
considered and their scores combined to provide an overall score for each
country from zero to 100.

1\. Research & Development: Research and development expenditure as a
percentage of GDP

2\. Manufacturing: Manufacturing value-added per capita

3\. High-tech companies: Number of domestically domiciled high-tech public
companies—such as aerospace and defense, biotechnology, hardware, software,
semiconductors, Internet software and services, and renewable energy companies
-- as a share of world's total high-tech public companies

4\. Postsecondary education: Number of secondary graduates enrolled in
postsecondary institutions as a percentage of cohort; percentage of labor
force with tertiary degrees; annual science and engineering graduates as a
percentage of the labor force and as a percentage of total tertiary graduates

5\. Research personnel: Professionals, including Ph.D. students, engaged in
R&D per 1 million population

6\. Patents: Resident utility patent filings per 1 million population and per
$1 million of R&D spent; utility patents granted as a percentage of world
total"

It doesn't mean their criteria for innovation is objective or correct, but
understanding them will hopefully elevate the discussion from just saying the
rankings are garbage -- which it well could be, but is a position arising from
emotion and not analysis. (I personally don't think rankings are useful, but
the underlying data may be)

[1] [https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-innovative-
countries...](https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-innovative-countries/)

~~~
tropo
Lots of those feel sort of tainted by the economic and legal situation.
Bloomberg totally left out any measure of citation impact.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citation_impact](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citation_impact)

------
blake8086
Why aren't I using tons of amazing South Korean and Swedish-designed products
in my daily life if this is the case? (or jealous of all the great products
they seem to have that I don't have access to?)

~~~
TorKlingberg
You probably are, if counting per capita of the country. Sweden has a small
population and South Korea medium.

South Korea: Samsung, LG, Hyundai, Kia

Sweden: Spotify, Skype (ish), 4G LTE (via Ericsson), Volvo, some medicines via
AstraZeneca (ish).

Also both produce various non-consumer products.

~~~
starsinspace
Don't forget IKEA...

~~~
gitmagic
And H&M, Minecraft, Battlefield, MySQL, Candy Crush, Absolut Vodka, The Pirate
Bay, Husqvarna, the pacemaker, the three-point seatbelt, the zipper, and much
more...

(And a lot of music, of course.)

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tanzbaer
I hate these articles. Some group decided on a less then meaningful set of
criteria to measure how innovative a country is and measures the US outside of
the top 10. This is used as the headline.

Then it's reported how a different group picked different criteria and puts
the US on rank #2 behind Switzerland.

Overall benefit of this article is less than zero because it wastes people's
time. Of course the US is one of if not the most innovative countries in the
world. Everyone with eyes can see that.

~~~
shanghaiaway
Butthurt because Murica isn't #1

~~~
dang
We've banned this account for repeatedly posting unsubstantive comments and
flamebait.

If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and
give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

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bcheung
I wouldn't say number of patents filed is a good metric for innovation.
Patents are more in line with the most bureaucratic and litigious.

~~~
sanxiyn
I agree software patents are pathological, but patents in other fields seem
fine. Most South Korean patents are not software anyway.

There is also a question of what is the better metric. Number of patents may
not be the best, but it seems adequate to me.

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bovermyer
This seems primarily targeted towards technological innovation.

I'd be curious to see a similar index for sociological innovation. By this, I
mean systemic experimentation and progress in social systems.

~~~
thatcat
How would sociological innovation be defined and measured?

~~~
bovermyer
That's an interesting question, and one I'm not qualified to answer. That's
part of why I asked the first question.

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imartin2k
This post is from early 2018. There is already a new annual ranking.
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-22/germany-n...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-22/germany-
nearly-catches-korea-as-innovation-champ-u-s-rebounds)

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porpoisely
Considering how so many awards and lists and rankings are politically driven
rather than based on facts or reality, I'll take this with a grain of salt.
Just like the two best universities are now british nonsense according to a
british run "Times Higher Education".

I'm sure there are a lot of great innovation going on in south korea and
sweden, but there is no way to measure "innovation". Is US patents really a
criteria for innovation ( Samsung has the most US patents after IBM according
to the article ). And I'm sure the world economic forum doesn't have an agenda
either.

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throwaway_45
The US is not in the top 10. Despite being the country the most people want to
come to. It has by far the most unicorns. More than the next three combined.
They ding the US for education. Does it really matter when people want to come
here?

~~~
mbrodersen
> Despite being the country the most people want to come to

What numbers do you have to back that statement up? Compared with Europe for
example?

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fhood
I am genuinely surprised that so many people were upset enough about the US'
exclusion from a _top 10 most whatever whatevers_ article that they felt the
need to rant about it in the comments.

US education statistics suck compared to other developed countries. They have
for a long time. So why are we surprised by the results of a list that uses
education as one of the factors?

~~~
nshung
I think the reason being that most people here do not share the same
definition of what is innovative or not based on the factors weighted by these
publications.

