Pairing Push and Pull Policies: A Heavy-Duty Model for Innovation (Varun Sivaram , CFR)

When policymakers mandate adoption of a particular technology, they run the risk that the technology may not yet exist or is too expensive for consumers. Similarly, when the government funds research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) of new technologies, it can’t be sure that any advances it underwrites will get picked up by the private sector and successfully taken to market. Even if the government pursues both activities separately—“pulling” technologies into the market through mandates or standards and “pushing” the development of new technologies through RD&D funding—these risks don’t go away.

http://blogs.cfr.org/sivaram/2016/09/27/pairing-push-and-pull-policies-a-heavy-duty-model-for-innovation/