Posts Tagged: "economist technology quarterly"

Looking Down on the Patent System from the Ivory Tower

The patent system is not a tool for entrenched interests to stifle competition, as so many professors seem to believe. Patents allow independent inventors and small companies to compete against better funded rivals, who would otherwise simply take away their inventions. Sadly, many publications, including The Economist, base anti-patent articles on the ill-conceived notions of academics. Alas, perhaps one reason our nation is in such distress is that so many policies are based on recommendations from those without any practical experience.

Statement of Senator Birch Bayh on the 30th Anniversary of the Bayh-Dole Act

Bayh-Dole was created because of a glaring problem– billions of hard earned tax dollars invested annually in government R&D were being squandered by ineffective government patent policies. If this research cannot be taken out of the labs and turned into products, the public is being short changed. Even so, it was a long, tough road to travel, and we only succeeded by the smallest of margins. Turning around long standing government policies, no matter how ineffective, is never easy.