Is there any empirical evidence to the contrary? Do these studies show that the increased R&D spending, VC investments, etc., are there specifically due to patent protection, and would otherwise not happen without? It seems crazy to think that would be true.
As much as I hate to defend big pharma, I can at least understand their need to patent things: billions of dollars in research scuttled in an instant after a new drug comes on the market and everyone and their mother copies it. But for many fields (such as software) that argument just doesn't apply.
And on top of that, when I think about the money wasted on defending patent suits (and often settling because it's more costly to win), and the money wasted on filing for patents in the first place (both in legal fees, and lost productivity tying up people's time documenting things for patent lawyers and reviewing findings)... I really can't see how our patent system actually makes us more innovative.
> Is there any empirical evidence to the contrary? Do these studies show that the increased R&D spending, VC investments, etc., are there specifically due to patent protection, and would otherwise not happen without?
Many of these studies do attempt to support their conclusions as rigorously as possible. This is unfortunately not enough because of the lack of sufficient data or contextual information. But as an example, some studies take specific events in history, such as the introduction of patent laws (or strengthening thereof for a specific field) in a certain country, and compare various metrics (e.g. derived from industrial data) before and after these events. As you can imagine, it is almost impossible to show direct causation, but these studies do find strong correlations.
Note that this is true for studies showing positive as well as negative effects of patent systems.
Big pharma is a very peculiar industry: it's saddled with millions of dollars in compliance costs and regulation so as to not kill the population. A government mandated intellectual monopoly could be justified there, to compensate the inherent costs of safe medical innovation.
By comparison, the tech industry has zero compliance costs and it's essentially a wild west.
As much as I hate to defend big pharma, I can at least understand their need to patent things: billions of dollars in research scuttled in an instant after a new drug comes on the market and everyone and their mother copies it. But for many fields (such as software) that argument just doesn't apply.
And on top of that, when I think about the money wasted on defending patent suits (and often settling because it's more costly to win), and the money wasted on filing for patents in the first place (both in legal fees, and lost productivity tying up people's time documenting things for patent lawyers and reviewing findings)... I really can't see how our patent system actually makes us more innovative.