The impact of subsidies on production innovation and sustainable growth

This paper investigates correlation between subsidies to invest in development projects, innovation, financial performance and sustainable growth. The focus of the study is on subsidies for co-financing purchases of new technological equipment aimed at promoting innovation and production of new products. Subsidies are distributed based on the prepared European Union (EU) and national programs for the purposes of faster economic growth in accordance with the policies and guidelines of the EU. The paper employs a combination of enterprises’ accounting data, data on subsidies and unique in-depth data obtained through a survey at the enterprise level. The results revealed a positive impact of subsidies on financial indicators, and only limited effect on innovation. While analyzing sustainable growth, we have established that the enterprises that received subsidies had a higher growth of financial indicators.