Does Copyright Piracy Pay? The Effects of U.S. International Copyright Laws on the Market for Books, 1790-1920

Does the lack of international copyrights benefit or harm developing countries? I examine the effects of U.S. copyright piracy during a period when the U.S. was itself a developing country. U.S. statutes since 1790 protected the copyrights of American citizens, but until 1891 deemed the works of foreign citizens to be in the public domain. In 1891, the laws were changed to allow foreigners to obtain copyright protection in the United States if certain conditions were met. Thus, this episode in American history provides us with a convenient way of investigating the consequences of international copyright piracy. My analysis is based on copyright registrations, information on authors, book titles and prices, financial data from the accounts of a major publishing company, and lawsuits regarding copyright questions. These data are used to investigate the welfare effects of widespread infringement of foreign works on American publishers, writers, and the public. The results suggest that the United States benefited from piracy and that the choice of copyright regime was endogenous to the level of economic development.

Technological Innovations and Endogenous Changes in U.S. Legal Institutions, 1790-1920

Recent scholarship highlights the importance of institutions to the processes of economic growth, but the precise nature of their relationship bears further examination. This paper considers how the evolution of legal institutions has contributed to, and in turn been affected by, major technological innovations. The first section of the paper examines the U.S. intellectual property system. Patent and copyright laws, and their interpretation and enforcement by the federal judiciary, certainly influenced the course of technical and cultural change, but it is clear that they did not develop independently of the state of technology and of the economy. Both the statutes and their interpretations altered in response to the introduction and diffusion of new technologies. The second section explores in more detail the impact of some of these technological innovations -- including steamboats, railroads, telegraphy, medical technologies, and automobiles -- on the common law, regulation and insurance. Such technological advances often led to institutional bottlenecks, which then required accommodations in legal rules and their enforcement. Although the common law had some capability for economizing on legal adjustment costs through 'adjudication by analogy', the socio-economic changes wrought by major innovations ultimately produced more fundamental change in legal institutions, such as shifts in the relative importance of state and federal policies, and in the degree of reliance on regulation by bureaucracy. In sum, the historical record of the evolution of legal rules and standards in the United States indicates a remarkable degree of flexibility as such institutions responded to changing economic circumstances.

Introduction

The significant breakthrough in plant biotechnology is the development of techniques to transform genes from unrelated sources into commercially important crop plants to develop resistance against insect pests. A local cotton cultivar MNH-93 was transformed through Agrobacterium tumefaciens strain C58C(1) assisted by bombardment with tungsten particles. The Agrobacterium strain contained the recombinant binary vector pKMAB harboring crylAb under 35S promoter. Neomycin phosphotransferase (nptII) gene was used as a selectable marker at a concentration of 50 mg L-1. The transformation efficiency remained 0.26%. The primary transformants were analyzed for transgene integration and expression through PCR and Southern Blotting and Western dot blot. The gene copy number was determined by Southern analysis in order to find out the crylAb integration sites. The Bt protein being produced in the transgenic plants was quantified using ImageQuant software, which ranged from 0.00 to 1.35% of the total protein. The positive plant seeds obtained from To progeny were further raised under greenhouse and field conditions to evaluate their field performance. Leaf biotoxicity assays were performed to determine the efficacy of introduced gene. The results showed that transgenic lines in T-1 progeny have appreciable level of resistance (40-60%) against lepidopteran pests in both green house and field conditions

Invisible Women: Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Family Firms in Nineteenth-Century France

The French economy has been criticized for a lack of integration of women in business and for the prevalence of inefficient family firms. A sample drawn from patent and exhibition records is used to examine the role of women in enterprise and invention in France. Middle-class women were extensively engaged in entrepreneurship and innovation, and the empirical analysis indicates that their commercial efforts were significantly enhanced by association with family firms. Such formerly invisible achievements suggest a more productive role for family-based enterprises, as a means of incorporating relatively disadvantaged groups into the market economy as managers and entrepreneurs. This business model .... melds entrepreneurial passion with a long family tradition. - Wendel Company (1704-2014)

Introduction

The significant breakthrough in plant biotechnology is the development of techniques to transform genes from unrelated sources into commercially important crop plants to develop resistance against insect pests. A local cotton cultivar MNH-93 was transformed through Agrobacterium tumefaciens strain C58C(1) assisted by bombardment with tungsten particles. The Agrobacterium strain contained the recombinant binary vector pKMAB harboring crylAb under 35S promoter. Neomycin phosphotransferase (nptII) gene was used as a selectable marker at a concentration of 50 mg L-1. The transformation efficiency remained 0.26%. The primary transformants were analyzed for transgene integration and expression through PCR and Southern Blotting and Western dot blot. The gene copy number was determined by Southern analysis in order to find out the crylAb integration sites. The Bt protein being produced in the transgenic plants was quantified using ImageQuant software, which ranged from 0.00 to 1.35% of the total protein. The positive plant seeds obtained from To progeny were further raised under greenhouse and field conditions to evaluate their field performance. Leaf biotoxicity assays were performed to determine the efficacy of introduced gene. The results showed that transgenic lines in T-1 progeny have appreciable level of resistance (40-60%) against lepidopteran pests in both green house and field conditions

Institutions and Technological Innovation During the Early Economic Growth: Evidence from the Great Inventors of the United States, 1790-1930

Employing a sample of renowned U.S. inventors that combines biographical detail with information on the patents they received over their careers, we highlight the impact of early U.S. patent institutions in providing broad access to economic opportunity and in encouraging trade in new technological knowledge. Through setting low fees and establishing administrative procedures for application, the United States deliberately created a patent system that allowed a much wider range, in socioeconomic class terms, of technologically creative individuals to obtain property rights to their inventions than did European patent institutions. Moreover, by requiring that applications be examined for novelty by technical experts, and by enforcing patent rights strictly, the U.S. system reduced uncertainty about the validity of patent rights, and in that way lowered the cost of transacting in them. Creating secure assets in new technological knowledge and facilitating access to markets in technology in this way both stimulated specialization at invention and further enhanced the opportunities available to technologically creative individuals who would otherwise have lacked the capital to directly extract returns from their efforts. Indeed, we show that until the late 19th century, the 'great inventors' of the U.S. generally had backgrounds that permitted them only limited formal schooling, and made extensive use of their abilities under the patent system to extract returns from trading their patent rights. The usefulness of the 19th century U.S. patent system to inventors with humble origins may have implications for the design of intellectual property institutions in contemporary developing countries.

Inventing Prizes: A Historical Perspective on Innovation Awards and Technology Policy

Prizes for innovations are currently experiencing a renaissance, following their marked decline during the nineteenth century. Debates about such incentive mechanisms tend to employ canonical historical anecdotes to motivate and support the analysis and policy proposals. Daguerre\u27s patent buyout, the Longitude Prize, inducement prizes for butter substitutes and billiard balls, the activities of the Royal Society of Arts and other encouragement institutions-all comprise potentially misleading case studies. The article surveys and summarizes extensive empirical research using samples drawn from Britain, France, and the United States, including great inventors and their ordinary counterparts, and prizes at industrial exhibitions. The results suggest that administered systems of rewards to innovators suffered from a number of disadvantages in design and practice, which might be inherent to their nonmarket orientation

Accounting for creativity: Lessons from the economic history of intellectual property and innovation

Social progress depends on the realization of inventive ideas, and economic history provides valuable lessons about creativity in technology and culture. The empirical study of over one hundred thousand innovative individuals who obtained patents, copyrights, and prizes, sheds light on the relationship between institutions, incentives, and transformative ideas and expression, over the past two centuries. The European growth model assumed useful knowledge was scarce, and top-down administered innovation systems offered rights and rewards to “exclusive” groups. By contrast, American policies regarded creativity as widely distributed in the general population, and further promoted “inclusive” market-oriented mechanisms that fostered diversity in ideas and outcomes. The evidence suggests that property rights in patents facilitated markets in ideas, and ensured that returns were aligned with productivity and market demand. Whereas, such administered systems as innovation prizes and publisher’s copyrights in the “creative industries” benefited the few rather than overall social welfare

Institutions and Technological Innovation During Early Economic Growth: Evidence from the Great Inventors of the United States, 1790 – 1930

Biographical information on a sample of renowned U.S. inventors is combined with information on the patents they received over their careers, and employed to highlight the implications of patent institutions for markets in inventions and for democratization. The United States deliberately created a patent system that differed from existing European systems in ways that significantly affected the course of technological change. Patent rights in the U.S. helped to define and enforce tradable assets in new technological knowledge. By facilitating access to such markets in technology, patents enhanced the benefits to relatively disadvantaged individuals who might otherwise have been unable to directly extract returns from their technological creativity, and their response to such incentives increased overall technological progress. For this reason, despite the defects of patent monopolies, developing economies today may still advance technological progress and improve social welfare by providing broad access to property rights in inventions.