The purpose of this paper is to give a brief overview of the impact knowledge and innovation has had throughout the last two decades on the economic changes between new and old EU members from the Lisbon Strategy (2000-2010) to the Europe 2020 strategy. The research carry out a cross country comparative analysis of competitiveness and innovation by examining the ratio of R&D expenditure to gross domestic product (GDP) as well as R&D funded by government and private sector. In essence, we found that the economic gap between the old EU countries and the new EU member states is significantly correlated with investing in R&D and existence of R&D intensity gap.  

Keywords - Knowledge, Innovations, the Europe 2020 strategy R&D, EU countries

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