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How Intellectual Property Reinforces Inequality
An anonymous reader writes "Here is an article by Dr.Joe Stiglitz on how intellectual property reinforces inequality by allowing patent owners to seek rent (aka license / sue) instead of delivering goods to the society. From the article: 'At first glance, the case, Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, might seem like scientific arcana: the court ruled, unanimously, that human genes cannot be patented, though synthetic DNA, created in the laboratory, can be. But the real stakes were much higher, and the issues much more fundamental, than is commonly understood. The case was a battle between those who would privatize good health, making it a privilege to be enjoyed in proportion to wealth, and those who see it as a right for all — and a central component of a fair society and well-functioning economy. Even more deeply, it was about the way inequality is shaping our politics, legal institutions and the health of our population.'"
That's common to all monopolies in general: by disallowing newcomers and competition, they serve no purpose but feeding whatever company/cartel holds that monopoly. And governments, instead of disrupting them, take more and more bribes to allow creating even more monopolies...
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
yes, the 'life is a race' concept. I heard of that. Nice concept. if everybody started at the same point (and not: some near the finish pole and others without legs outside the stadium)
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
I've tried making that argument, but most people won't really care until it becomes a talking point beaten to death by demagogues on TV. Also, I cringed a bit when I read that summary, because every phrase screams "leftist academic". That's one of the quickest and easiest ways to get dismissed by moderates and center-right allies.
Ah, but all people should be equally valued in the eyes of the law. That's the point. Laws should not favor the rich over the poor, or one ethnicity over another. While one person may be born into wealth, and their possession of it, therefore a given, another person born into poverty should not be barred from obtaining wealth through hard work and careful planning. When laws exist that effectively preclude the poor from gaining wealth, we now have inequality in the law, and that is what the article describes.
Learning about brewing beer, by brewing beer.
The problem with IP today is the complete lack of reasonable limits on who can make money from IP and for how long.
It's is fundamentally unfair to the world to expect unlimited and life-long (or longer) income from your IP (or even worse, from someone else's IP to which you have acquired the 'rights').
IP is a human mental construct that was brought into being to address fairness. The pendulum has swung way too far.
Amazingly confused.
Your first paragraph directlt contradicts your second.
Newton stood on the shoulders of giants because he didn't have to pay some mob of rent-seekers for the priviledge.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
As for a “lot of inequity” - we should not live in a winner takes all, class bound gilded society – that takes away the incentive for hard work.
The paradox of extremes. In a communistic society, there's no reason to work hard because your can get the same rewards without exertion. In what we simplistically call a "capitalistic" society there's no reason to work hard because the people who got there first will deny you the benefits anyway.
I use quotes around "capitalistic" because the term is routinely expanded to include aspects of business and philosophy that have nothing to do with how you raise and use capital.
If I start with nothing, work hard, and generate superior r results I get nothing?
the part where hard work generates results is nice. in reality though, luck is much more important than all other factors.
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
But then, there is the matter of how many people you've met, and how diverse their walks of life are. If you are born into a family known for its success, you are likely to grow up around other children from families that are also known for success. Furthermore, those children are taught to believe that their success is due purely to their own "hard work". They don't actually have to work hard because they are taught how to use their family's advantages such as inheritance and connections with the other families known for success. Utilizing that knowledge is furthermore seen as the end all and be all of "hard work", when in fact it doesn't even begin to compare to the difficulty of the work those not similarly advantaged have to do just to survive much less be successful. Furthermore, those families tend to stick together into adulthood so these notions are all constantly reinforced in addition to your notion that practically everyone you met that "worked hard" were successful. It becomes a tautology. Just how many people have you met that haven't "worked hard" anyways?