Re: AltInst: Patent Buyouts

I posted this article & abstract:
>Quarterly Journal of Economics, Nov. 1998, pp. 1137-1167.
>Patent Buyouts: A Mechanism for Encouraging Innovations
> by Michael Kremer
>... Most patents purchased would be placed in the public
>domain, but to induce bidders to reveal their valuations, a few
>would be sold to the highest bidder.

Lee Daniel Crocker responded:

>The obvious problem is that it's impossible to know the "value"
>of an innovation until long after it has been in use.

Reread that last sentence of the abstract. The idea is to hold
an auction for each patent, but then to usually not actually
sell most of them, using the auction price to pay the creator.
See the article for more details.

Robin Hanson
hanson@econ.berkeley.edu http://hanson.berkeley.edu/
RWJF Health Policy Scholar FAX: 510-643-8614
140 Warren Hall, UC Berkeley, CA 94720-7360 510-643-1884
after 8/99: Assist. Prof. Economics, George Mason Univ.

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Received on Wed Apr 7 17:35:32 1999