Patents: unnecessary evil or tool of the people?

Copyrights and patents are usually argued to protect the right of the creator so they can make some kind of money from their creation. But the issue goes deeper than people having the right to make money from their own idea.

Boldrin and Levine (2007) argue that patents actually do the opposite of what they were purposed for, and hinder economic growth through lawsuits and not allowing others to add to the idea for years if not decades. Using the example of the steam engine and how it was not Watt's first patent that made the steam engine what it is, but rather a combination of 3 or 4 ideas that made the steam engine a viable source of propulsion and good for widespread adoption.

However this idea that patents are evil since they don't protect their owners anyway overlooks the 2nd main purpose of a patent system: 'promoting public disclosure of new ideas' (Pol and Carroll 2007, p60). Had Watt not patented his plans for a steam engine, had he not made it public, than no one would have had the basis for which to make it better. The only way others would be able to create steam engines (without Watt's basis) would be to reverse engineer Watt’s engines when he sold them publicly. However this would have added many more years of research and design than the patent of a forced monopoly did.

Trade Secrets, although hard to keep, allow businesses to stay as a monopoly forever (or until someone reverse engineers or discovers the product by themselves randomly). Coca-Cola keep the recipe a trade secret which means, although they have no patent, no one it seems is able to match their flavour. This is a minor example, but imaging if say a medical engineer invented a new tool that made heart surgery 10x safer but decided not to patent his idea but instead allow doctors to use it but never keep it (to save it from reverse engineering). He would have a limitless potential to make money from it but there would be no point where his idea became freely public and allowed others to produce this new device. Granted the example is farfetched it proves the point that patents, although creating forced monopolies, do have the potential for good.

Although it is sometimes used to simply keep market control. Things such as Bogus patents where an extremely minor insignificant thing of a product is changed in order to get is passed for a new patent (known as a bogus patent) (Pol and Carroll 2007, p65). So although there are some negatives to the system, the greater good it can do makes it a viable system and one to keep.



REFERENCES

Boldrin, M. and Levine, D.K. 2007, 'introduction' in Against Intellectual Monopoly, Cambridge University Press, Cabridge, UK, pp1-15.

Pol, E. and Carroll, P. 2007, 'The Creative Economy: First Principles', in An Introduction to the Creative Economy, McGraw Hill, North Ryde, NSW, pp.33-78.