Patents Awarded per 1,000 Individuals in Science and Engineering Occupations (Patents)

This indicator represents state patent activity normalized to the size of its S&E workforce, specifically employees in S&E occupations. People in S&E occupations include engineers; computer, mathematical, life, physical, and social scientists; and postsecondary teachers in these fields. Managers, technicians, elementary and secondary schoolteachers, and medical personnel are not included.

Although the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office grants several types of patents, this indicator covers only utility patents, commonly known as patents for inventions. Utility patents can be granted for any new, nonobvious, useful, or improved method, process, machine, device, manufactured item, or chemical compound and represent a key measure of intellectual property. Patents were fractionally allocated among states based on the proportion of residences of all named inventors.

Data on individuals in S&E occupations come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupational Employment Statistics Survey, a survey of workplaces that assigns workers to a state based on where they work. Estimates are developed by BLS from data provided by state workforce agencies and do not include self-employed persons. Situations in which workers live in one state and work in another introduce some imprecision into the calculation of this indicator. Estimates for states with smaller populations are generally less precise than estimates for states with larger populations.

Data sources: Science-Metrix, special tabulation from U.S. Patent and Trademark Office data in PatentsView; U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment Statistics Survey.