Joseph Stiglitz on Intellectual Property

Formerly Chief Economist at the Bank, the Nobel Laureate wrote a short piece on intellectual property in the Daily Times of Pakistan:

Without intellectual property protection, incentives to engage in certain types of creative endeavors would be weakened. But there are high costs associated with intellectual property. Ideas are the most important input into research, and if intellectual property slows down the ability to use others’ ideas, then scientific and technological progress will suffer. In fact, many of the most important ideas – for example, the mathematics that underlies the modern computer or the theories behind atomic energy or lasers – are not protected by intellectual property.

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