I never attacked Tabarrok’s motives. I just believe what he is proposing is manifestly unlibertarian. He might be concerned about the detrimental effect of price controls on medical innovation. I would be concerned about $82 billion + additional taxes.

As to whether he’s really behind this bill: in the earlier post, he calls it “a bill that I might actually sign on to”. Doesn’t sound too uncertain to me. Further, he says he likes “that the funding amounts are serious” — i.e., big, and that the funding “would be available to non-patented products”–that is, it’s granting a tax-subsidized award to things that are not even patented now. He says, “I would be reassured if the system were clearly voluntary – that is, pharmaceutical manufacturers should have the option of the patent or the prize.” In other words, we would still have the patent system; this is not even a substitute for a patent system. It’s both: patent system plus prize system, all funded by or imposing costs on the taxpayer and the economy.

Note also, in his more recent post, he says, “We need to reduce intellectual monopoly with patent reform, less copyright protection, and a greater use of patent substitutes like prizes”–with the latter word “prizes” linking to his previous endorsement of the Sanders plan. So, we “need” “greater use of” “Sanders-plan-like prizes”. Again, I don’t see him as waffling here. He seems to really favor it.

I don’t doubt he’s sincere. I don’t doubt he’s in favor of this because of some other concern. I don’t doubt he thinks it might actually benefit the economy somehow. I just think he’s wrong. I think this is theft, unjust, and ludicrous, and would do nothing but hamper the economy even further and become yet another corrupt state disaster.

I also disagree that “price controls” is a serious independent threat–we have subsidized companies, heavily regulated by the FDA and subject to fickle state tort laws, and navigating the patent maze–all this spawned by the state. Sucking $82B+ more from our pockets is hardly going to be an improvement, even if it did “reduce the pressure for price controls” (which I don’t see as a huge, independent problem anyway, nor as one that would be ameliorated by a prize system anyway).

I actually respect your work on the issue of IP greatly. Your writing was not a minor factor in my own conversion on IP.

But I think you came off as a little harsh to a fellow traveler who is intellectually searching. Tabarrok’s isn’t an all-or-nothing hard liner and does a good amount of pareto improvement searching in his posting. My impression on the prize system wasn’t that he is 100% behind it- but threw it out there as an intellectual probe saying that he “might” sign on to it. He then goes on to explain why he considers this to be an improvement. In fact he says the most important part of it is to avoid a worse government intervention:

“Most importantly, a prize fund would make clear the tradeoff between pharmaceutical revenues and R&D and it would reduce the pressure for price controls which I think are a serious threat to future medical innovation”

If you disagree with this reasoning, I can live with that. But to attack his motives as unlibertarian is the wrong avenue on this one. Tabarrok is clearly worried about worse interventions.

I actually respect your work on the issue of IP greatly. Your writing was not a minor factor in my own conversion on IP.

But I think you came off as a little harsh to a fellow traveler who is intellectually searching. Tabarrok’s isn’t an all-or-nothing hard liner and does a good amount of pareto improvement searching in his posting. My impression on the prize system wasn’t that he is 100% behind it- but threw it out there as an intellectual probe saying that he “might” sign on to it. He then goes on to explain why he considers this to be an improvement. In fact he says the most important part of it is to avoid a worse government intervention:

“Most importantly, a prize fund would make clear the tradeoff between pharmaceutical revenues and R&D and it would reduce the pressure for price controls which I think are a serious threat to future medical innovation”

If you disagree with this reasoning, I can live with that. But to attack his motives as unlibertarian is the wrong avenue on this one. Tabarrok is clearly worried about worse interventions.

“This is the sort of silly attack that has made me largely leave Mises.org for more intellectual libertarian outlets.”

I was very respectful to Tabarrok. However, I fail to see what is wrong with exposing outrageously unlibertarian schemes, even those advanced by fellow libertarians.

“How can Kinsella not know who Tabarrok is?”

I have heard of him here and there, but just don’t know a lot about him. Sorry.

“And anyone who is willing to post on someone else should at least know the context in what the person is writing. Tabarrok is actually an anarcho-capitalist.”

An anarcho-capitalist proposing $80B in taxes, or more, if the logic of this proposal were to be carried thru. His comments have to stand on their own. That he is an A-C does not change anything.

“What is proposing here- if you will read his previous posts on the subject- is nothing more than a pareto improvement of the current situation. I’ll take it over the status quo any day.”

It’s not a pareto improvement at all. The proposal, first, would not eliminate the patent office. Tabarrok in his comments makes it clear that the $80B prize fund would be in addition to the patent system: “pharmaceutical manufacturers should have the option of the patent or the prize.” So now we have the patent office and at least most of its costs, plus more tax and spend and further detrimental results from this–and who in his right mind thinks they would stop at $80B for pharmaceutical patents? Is that the only innovation worth rewarding? We can reach a trillion or four very easily. And this is anarchist? libertarian? pareto-improvement? Ha!

Further, he is in favor of using the $80B to subsidize types of innovation not currently covered by the patent system, thus expanding government subsidy/intervention even further: “I like that the funding amounts are serious and would be available to non-patented products (innovations without property rights are underfunded).”

Tabarrok may be a nice guy and a since libertarian on matters outside IP. But this is madness.

How can Kinsella not know who Tabarrok is?

And anyone who is willing to post on someone else should at least know the context in what the person is writing. Tabarrok is actually an anarcho-capitalist. What is proposing here- if you will read his previous posts on the subject- is nothing more than a pareto improvement of the current situation. I’ll take it over the status quo any day.

Wonderful person
Accept my sincere thanks and appreciation
John

http://www.dirking.net

Wonderful person
Accept my sincere thanks and appreciation
John

http://www.dirking.net

The purpose of patents is to encourage an inventor to not keep the invention a secret. Without patent protection, publishing an invention allows anyone to build it without the need to pay the inventor for his work. So without patent protection it is in an inventors best interest to keep it a secret so he can be the one to profit from it.

Fund new inventions, but *not* with a predetermined prize, but rather, a tax on any first purchase of an implementation of the invention, and then send the money back to the inventor!

Oh, but wait, the government would have no idea how to set the right tax rate to proportionally deliver the generated consumer surplus to the inventor. So maybe the inventor could set the tax, and the revenues (net of administration) would go to him: then, inventors would pick the revenue maximizing rate, and entrepreneurs would be getting the right signals for how to employ their scarce resources to the creation of inventions (and of what kind) as opposed to other pursuits.

Brilliant!

Oh wait, that is the patent system.

You’re right. If I put my mind, muscles and savings into committing a bank robbery, the loot should be recognized as my legitimate property! What’s with this arrest and imprisonment nonsense?”

Good analogy. After all property is theft, according to you isn’t it?

That idiotic patent system was designed by socialists just like Kinsella. These people, just like Kinsella, wanted to socialize property. (No wonder then, Kinsella is a patent attorney.)

They wanted the society to own the invention after all. Only they let the inventor earn a little before they socialized his property. Since no middle of the road policy of these socialists work, patent system doesn’t work either.

Patent system puts a time limit and forces the owner to give up his property. But since it wants to let the inventor earn some before they socialize the property, they put in a system that ignores the possibility of independent discovery and establish a first come first own system.

Also this stupid system put in place by socialists, lets other socialists to make the system a scape goat of all IP thus advocating parasitism. Which is internally consistent at least for socialists, since socialism is parasitism.

You’re right. If I put my mind, muscles and savings into committing a bank robbery, the loot should be recognized as my legitimate property! What’s with this arrest and imprisonment nonsense?

Baloney. I work in software and software is one of the least capital intensive industry. Try Oil exploration for a capital intensive industry. That said, I am not fully convinced about Stephan’s arguments against IP. I just ordered a book from mises.org to get some more facts.

“Actually patents can expand upon a prior invention and be patentable and “practiced” long before the prior art patent is expired. The requirement is that the improvement must be substantial. I actually do understand the system though not to the degree of a patent lawyer.”

This is completely incorrect.

There are two things at issue here. 1. Can the improvement be patented? 2. does the improved device or process infringe the “base” patent?

These are independent questions, and neither turns on any “substantial improvement” test at all.

The first question turns on whether the improvement is nonobvious or not. It has nothing whatever to do with whether the improvement is “substantial.” In fact a “minor” improvement can of course be patented, so long as it’s non-obvious.

Whether or not the improvement is patentable or patented does not determine the second question, since receiving a patent does not give the inventor a right to practice it, but only a right to stop others from practicing it. So let’s say you have a VERY “substantial” “improvement” to patented invention X, and you patent your improvement X’. So long as device or process X’ contains all of the claimed elements of X, it infringes the X patent to make, use, or sell X’. It does not matter if X’ represents a substantial improvement over X. It does not matter that X’ has its own patent. This is all irrelevant. You really do not know what you are talking about. This is fine, as you are obviously a layman, but why you think you ought to weigh in on this technical area is a mystery.

However, you missed the point I was attempting to communicate. It was not a specific defense of the current patent system operating in the U. S., but to point out that the purpose of the system in general is for the benefit of the public and therefore the market.

As I said, prior to patents an inventor would often keep the idea private so he could use it for profit. This would cause others to not be able to improve the invention in the future as they did not know how it worked. While this is not a problem for a consumer good as that could be disassembled. It is a problem for a manufacturer as the machine used to make an item is a secret so a competitor would find it more difficult to enter the market. And if the inventor never reveals the secret the invention dies with him. Patents allow the inventor to publish his secret while still keeping the ability to profit for a period of time. It also allows others to look at the published invention and determine how to improve it. Even if the improvement cannot be used for a period of time it is at least available, unlike if the invention was kept secret by the now dead inventor.

The current patent system used in the U. S. has problems but the purpose of patents, which is to give the inventor an incentive to publish by allowing him to still profit is valid.

Without patents, if I publish my design for an invention, it would allow you with your greater capital to take that invention and produce it at a lower cost and faster to market, than I with my more limited capital can produce it. So without patents it is in my best interest to not publish my invention until I have secured enough capital to produce it. And if I am never successful the invention dies with me. Now if that invention were as important as the Gutenberg press it would be a significant loss.

Sure it does. If there is a patent on X and I improve it, in most cases, I cannot practice the improvement for 17 years or so–until the patent for X expires. Even if my improvement is itself patentable and I get a patent on X’. Why do people post so cock-sure on things they obviously know nothing about? This is a recurring habit of IP defenders: they will vociferously defend a system that they evidently do not even understand. Why they are so passionate about something they do not really comprehend is a mystery. Why not just remain agnostic about it, like my grandmother? She knows nothing about IP but does not feel compelled to form or voice an opinion, either?

Patents in general are not the problem. The problem is allowing patents on “ideas” that are so broad that they allow a company to coerce payment from another inventor who creates something even remotely similar. Business process, software and some drug patents are examples of this.

Allowing a physical object to be patented does not prevent someone from improving the design and creating a new innovation, that is the purpose of patents.

Joe has a dream one night, about a new invention that will change the world…or at least make gobs of money. That day, he tells his buddy, Dave, about his dream. The next day, Joe has forgotten all about the dream cuz he drank a six-pack of beer before bed that night, but Dave takes the idea, spends some money, develops the invention, and makes gobs of money.

What happened here? Was Joe the “owner” of the thing Dave made, by virtue of it having been his idea? Even if Joe never did anything with his idea, could he ethically prevent Dave from spending his own money and time building the invention and bringing it to market? Dave might not be a very good buddy, but is he a thief?