Visualizzazione post con etichetta alex tabarrok entrepreneurial economics. Mostra tutti i post
Visualizzazione post con etichetta alex tabarrok entrepreneurial economics. Mostra tutti i post

giovedì 18 gennaio 2018

Processissimo

Idea per sveltire la giustizia civile: perché non celebriamo un solo processo all'anno? Un solo processo che li racchiuda tutti.
Forse esagero: facciamone uno per ogni tipo di infrazione. Ma uno solo.
Diffamazione? Un solo processo all'anno. Violazione del copyright? Un solo processo all'anno. Schiamazzi notturni? Un solo processo all'anno. Eccetera.
Un processo è meno impegnativo che mille processi.
Tutti i danneggiati vengono rappresentati dall' Avvocato Unico dell' Accusa, che istituisce una griglia di risarcimenti secondo il merito di ciascuno dei suoi clienti. L' Avvocato Unico della Difesa, poi, sceglierà il caso concreto da trattare. La logica è la stessa che usano le mie foglie per ripartirsi la torta: tu tagli, io scelgo.
In caso di condanna, la griglia totale dei risarcimenti dovuti è già bella e pronta. In caso di condanna con risarcimento corretto, alla griglia viene apportata una correzione proporzionale.
Variazioni ammesse: anziché un processo campione possono essere due, tre, venti. Anziché attribuire in modo rigido "taglio" e "scelta", si possono mixare i ruoli.
#Amazon
This intriguing collection is designed to show how economists can play a more active role in designing and directing the nation's social institutions. By taking the task of…
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mercoledì 17 gennaio 2018

10. Tutta la giustizia in un unico processo

i problemi della class action.
Come accelerare la giustizia. Class action. Fare 100 processi al posto di mille.
debolezza di questo metodo. Primo  priva la parte convenuta del giusto processo ad hoc.
Secondo, il risarcimento danni può essere equo per l'imputato ma non per i convenuti. Iniquità verso il ricorrente.
Occorre un modo nuovo per aggregare i processi.
Per  molti il processo è una ricerca di giustizia. La statistica lo snatura.
La statistica disincentiva i ricorsi. Aumentano invece gli incentivi a ritirarsi dalla causa.
Le regole sul riparto ottimo possono aiutarci.
Nella classe ci sono ricorrenti con posizioni diverse, alcune più forti altre meno.
L avvocato deo ricorrenti deve presentare una griglia di risarcimenti sulla base della forza di ciascuna posizione dei ricorrenti.
Avvocato dell'accusato deve scegliere i casi da  discutere.
In caso di Vittoria dei ricorrenti il piano redatto dall'avvocato costituirà il risarcimento per ciascuna parte.
Nel caso di riduzione del risarcimento chiesto tutti i risarcimenti vengono ridotti proporzionalmente.
Se viene selezionato un campione il risarcimento dovuto esclusi è proporzionale ai successi di alle riduzioni di risarcimento operato su campione.
Si vince e si perde insieme.
La protezione in gruppo potrebbe essere più economica rispetto a quella dei singoli processi separati.
Ulteriore semplificazione. L'avvocato può suddividere i ricorrenti in classi omogenee.
La procedura può essere generalizzata su qualsiasi causa con danno quantificabile.
Le proporzioni del reparto devono essere osservate anche in caso di transazione.
Resta il problema giuridico. Possiamo dire che il diritto al giusto processo è stato mantenuto?
Altro problema, c'è un risparmio di denaro? Le somme in parte sono elevate in casi del genere le metodologie seguite sono molto più costose D'altro canto i casi trattati si riducono drasticamente. Accuratezza cresce. Se le due misure non crescono proporzionalmente probabilmente si realizzerà una convenienza. Bisogna tener conto anche del costo della stima.
Riassunto. L'avvocato produce Stime Più accurati e meno costose dei verdetti singoli che produrrebbero i giudici.
Problema. Il rapporto con l'avvocato si complica. Al cliente conviene ingannarlo. E se gli altri clienti sono più bravi di te Peggio per te.
Altro problema. Il compito degli avvocati difensori viene facilitato. Loro scelgono il caso da trattare di conseguenza l'ultima parola.
Alternativa per mitigare il vantaggio della difesa. Sia l'avvocato difensore che quello della cosa producono un reparto. E ciascuno dei due Seleziona un campione.
Applicazione generalizzata del metodo reparto. Si prendono tutte le cause omogenee risolto con un risarcimento quantitativo. Si prende un unico avvocato della Difesa è un unico avvocato dell'accusa e si procede come abbiamo appena visto.
Cause omogenee. Infrazione della proprietà intellettuale. Danni fisici. Diffamazione.
Unico problema. I clienti vengono privati del loro diritto di scegliersi l'avvocato.

martedì 30 maggio 2017

Assicurazioni genetiche

Tra poco potremo leggere il nostro futuro nel genoma e la cosa non avrà solo aspetti positivi, con le potenzialità in arrivo molti di noi non potranno più permettersi un’assicurazione sanitaria. Di questi problemi si occupa Alexander Tabarrok nel suo “Gene Insurance” proponendo una soluzione abbastanza sorprendente:     
Now, thanks to advances in genetic research, medical practitioners are increasingly able to read your health future from a much more reliable source-your individual genetic code. The correlation between specific genes and some diseases is now well established…However, accurate genetic information also brings fear that health insurance could become unaffordable or even unavailable
Probabilmente ci saranno discriminazioni sul lavoro, chi desidera assumere lavoratori malaticci destinati ad assentarsi spesso?  
… And because most individuals are insured through their employer, some people worry that knowledge of genetic traits might lead to employment discrimination
Si potrebbe limitare l’accesso ai test da parte di certi soggetti ma si tratterebbe di una soluzione difficile da applicare, oppure si potrebbe ripartire i costi sulla comunità ma si tratterebbe sempre di soluzioni inefficienti: 
… Solutions that would maintain access to health insurance have been proposed, but most would almost inevitably lead to antiselection and a disruption of the underwriting process, with potentially dire impact on the solvency of insurers….
In casi del genere la soluzione efficiente esiste, si chiama assicurazione genetica.
Di cosa si tratta?  Semplice: ci si assicura contro l’eventualità di geni cattivi.
For a small premium cost, genetic insurance would insure against possessing a "bad" gene. Policies would be sold to all individuals before they underwent genetic testing… For example, if a woman is found to be carrying BRCAI (the gene related to a higher probability of breast cancer), she would be paid enough to purchase actuarially sound risk premiums… We are used to thinking of insuring against sickness; genetic insurance makes it equally possible to insure against a high probability of sickness….
Ci si puo’ assicurare contro un evento negativo ma ci si puo’ assicurare anche contro la probabilità di un evento negativo. Cosa lo vieta?
L’assicurazione genetica porta parecchi benefici: trattamenti mirati, trattamenti anticipati. Se poi è obbligatoria evitiamo dinamiche di selezione avversa.
All the benefits of genetic testing, such as improved treatment and health planning targeted to offset a genetic vulnerability, could be exploited… The single ground rule of mandatory purchase would avoid the problem of adverse selection.
Le possibilità di frode sono comunque ridotte:
… First, most people do not carry serious genetic defects, so the expected gain from concealing a positive result, and thereby cheating an insurer, is small… enforcement would be carried out through medical institutions rather than by individuals… In the near future, genetic testing is likely to be fully integrated into the medical process…
Ma il beneficio migliore riguarda il fatto di avere “geni cattivi” non vi impedirà più di stipulare un’assicurazione sanitaria (paga l’assicurazione, infatti): 
Insurance firms, under this proposal, would no longer have an incentive to drop customers with genetic defects… Individuals with serious genetic defects would buy their insurance individually (or as part of a special genetic group) rather than through their employer. Employers also would have far fewer incentives to genetically discriminate….
L’assicurazione genetica potrebbe avere un impatto negativo sulle polizze vita, ma il problema è risolvibile imponendo l’accesso alle informazioni:
Genetic insurance also could improve the life insurance market. Life insurance contracts usually are written for much longer terms than health insurance contracts… If insurance companies have access to information from genetic tests, many people will want to buy long-term life insurance before the tests are taken. Under this scenario, genetic tests will not cause great difficulties for the life insurance market. But if legislation makes genetic information "private," very serious adverse selection problems could occur…. Genetic information should be accessible by life insurance companies along with other types of health information…
L’assicurazione genetica dovrebbe avere costi modesti perché a guardar bene già oggi si paga un premio di rischio genetico, cosicché il costo totale delle polizze dovrebbe restare invariato. Se poi teniamo conto delle cure mirate e della prevenzione si stima un costo inferiore a quello presente.
… It seems likely that everyone who today purchases health insurance also will be able to purchase genetic insurance… Genetic insurance cannot raise the total cost of health insurance because today's health insurance already covers the possibility of possessing a defective gene, but it does so implicitly, and given today's technology, inefficiently… Separating the genetic and nongenetic health insurance markets cannot raise the total price of health insurance because the same product is being sold… In fact, the total price of health insurance will fall under this proposal. Individuals who gain early knowledge of a genetic defect can seek earlier treatment, which is usually cheaper and more effective…

La fabbrica delle idee

L’argomento che affronta Michael Kremer nel suo saggio “Patent Buyouts” è centrale:
… Economic growth ultimately depends on the production of new ideas, but competitive markets do not provide appropriate incentives for the production of ideas…
Ci si è provato in tutti i modi:
… Historically, societies have used a wide variety of mechanisms to encourage production of ideas. Some, such as patents and copyrights, provide inventors with monopolies over goods produced using their ideas. Others, such as the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the synthetic fuels program, directly subsidize research…
Il sistema dei brevetti e dei diritti d’autore è altamente distorsivo:
… Patents and copyrights create insufficient incentives for original research because inventors cannot fully capture consumer surplus or spillovers of their ideas to other researchers. Patents and copyrights also create static distortions from monopoly pricing and encourage socially wasteful expenditures on reverse engineering to invent around patents…
Anche la ricerca sussidiata dallo stato non funziona:
… before research is conducted, the government may not know the costs and expected benefits of research, and it may not even be able to conceive of some inventions. Allowing government officials wide discretion to set payments to inventors ex post may lead to rent seeking and to expropriation of investors after their research costs are sunk…
Un suggerimento puo’ venirci dalla storia. Avete presente la sorte del dagherrotipo?
… In 1839, the government of France combined elements of the patent system and of direct government support of research by purchasing the patent for daguerreotype photography and placing the technique in the public domain. After the patent was bought out, daguerreotype photography was rapidly adopted worldwide and was subject to myriad technical improvements….
Purtroppo, l’acquisto governativo dei brevetti ha un inconveniente: quanto pagare. E qui viene avanzata una proposta:
… government would offer to buy out patents at this private value times a fixed markup that would roughly cover the difference between the social and private values of inventions. Inventors could decide whether to sell or retain their patents… However, in order to provide auction participants with an incentive to truthfully reveal their valuations, the government would randomly select a few patents that would be sold to the highest bidder. Encouraging innovation through such a mechanism would require more discretion by government officials than the current patent system but substantially less discretion than that exercised by, say, the National Institutes of Health…
Ci sono dei precedenti su cui poter lavorare per una messa a punto del meccanismo al fine di eliminare l’aspetto confiscatorio:
… Macfie (1869), a member of the British Parliament in the nineteenth century, proposed replacing the patent system with a reward system. In this century, Polanyi (1943) suggested replacing patents with rewards based on ex-post estimates of the value of inventions. Guell and Fischbaum (1995) suggest that the government use its power of eminent domain to purchase pharmaceutical patents. They propose that judges determine the buyout price. One problem with allowing broad administrative discretion over the patent buyout price is that this may lead to purchases at confiscatory prices and thus reduce incentives for innovation. Allowing broad discretion may also lead to wasteful expenditures on rent seeking… Patent buyouts would thus supplement, rather than replace, the existing patent system. Inventors would receive a markup over the private value of the patents to bring incentives for invention closer to the social value…
Problemi:
… One problem with a fixed reward is that people could claim rewards for trivial inventions… but perhaps the chief problem with patent buyouts is that they are potentially vulnerable to collusion, because inventors could bribe auction participants to submit high bids…
Come porre rimedio alle collusioni? Ci sono alcuni modi un po’ scontati:
… The government could make collusion more difficult using standard procedures such as requiring bids to be sealed, punishing companies and individuals found guilty of collusion, and rewarding whistle-blowers
Poi ci sono alcuni modi più legati alla struttura dell’asta. Per esempio quello di considerare solo la terza offerta più alta:
… The government would base the price it offers the inventor on the third highest bid. The original patent holder would therefore have to bribe three companies instead of one to ensure a substantial increase in the buyout price…
Oppure di trasformare il governo in un broker speculativo quando ha sentore di collusione:
… suppose that, based on the other bids and any knowledge of the industry, the government's best estimate of the patent's value was it. If a bidder offered it + x and the agency suspected collusion," the government could offer to buy out the patent at it + $1 and then require the suspected colluding bidder to purchase the patent at its bid of it + x. The government would make a profit of x - 1 from the attempted collusion…
Ci sono poi metodi legati alla trasparenza delle società partecipanti:
… The government could develop lists of suspect bidders by checking whether winning bidders made money… bidders would have to provide information on any ties they had with the inventor…
Si possono istituire dei costi fissi:
… Bidders could be required to pay a licensing fee or deposit allowing them to participate in a number of auctions. This would make it unprofitable for patent holders to set up dummy companies…
Naturalmente sarebbe proibito il riacquisto a cura dell’inventore:
…  inventors would be prohibited from buying back the patent from the winning bidder or making other payments to bidders…
Ci sono poi delle modalità per stabilire un tetto alle offerte governative.
Si consideri comunque che esistono molte istituzioni minacciate dalla collusione e invece immuni dal fenomeno, si pensi alla peer-review:
… it is also important to remember that many institutions that are theoretically vulnerable to collusion operate relatively well. For example, peer review is highly vulnerable to collusion, yet the NSF and NIH seem relatively effective…
E poi il livello ottimale di collusione oltre il quale la soluzione proposta perderebbe di efficienza non è pari a zero.
… Even if collusion raises patent prices above their social value, the social value of inventions may be approximated better by the collusive price than by the existing patent system…
La soluzione dell’asta comunque non è universale, bisognerà studiare i vari casi specifici per valutare l’esistenza di mercati sufficientemente “densi” da rendere anonima l’emersione di un prezzo:
… The auction mechanism described in this chapter may be appropriate for many pharmaceuticals, but it would not be appropriate in industries where markets are too thin for auctions or patents are not an effective means of protecting inventions. In such industries, the government could simply offer to buy out patents for an amount equal to postbuyout sales times an administratively determined estimate of the average consumer surplus per unit of the good consumed…

sabato 20 maggio 2017

Un mercato per gli organi umani

Con il sistema attuale di donazione la carenza di organi disponibili per i trapianti è sotto gli occhi di tutti, la gran parte dei malati in attesa di un rene attenderà invano. E’ questo il dato di fatto da cui parte Alexander Tabarrok per proporre la riforma contenuta in “The Organ Shortage”:
The current system for motivating the supply of human organs has failed to end the shortage. Thousands of people die every year while they wait helplessly for an organ transplant and thousands more will die in the next few years… Today, roughly 60,000 people are waiting for organ transplants, although less than 10,000 will become donors.
Già in passato molti economisti hanno affrontato il problema chiedendo di istituire un mercato degli organi:
… For many years, a number of economists and economics-minded lawyers have offered their solution to the crisis: remove the legal restrictions on the purchase and sale of human organs (Becker 1997; Epstein 1993, 1997; Cohen 1989; Pindyck and Rubinfeld 1998; Barnett, Blair & Kaserman (1996, this volume).' The economic argument is familiar. Just as rent controls create a shortage of rental apartments, government rules that outlaw the buying or selling of organs on the open market hold the price of organs at zero and make an organ shortage inevitable…
Senonché la soluzione è apparsa a molti “ripugnante” e respinta al mittente. Non c’è motivo di dubitare sulla veridicità di questo giudizio visto che tra gli scontenti ci sono anche alcune Associazioni di malati:
… Discomfort with organ sales is so strong that even some people who are desperately waiting for an organ are against allowing monetary compensation for donation. Many people feel that organ sales violate a moral intuition about the inalienability of the body…
Altri temono le diseguaglianze. Difficile arginare unb problema del genere senza perdere l’efficienza garantita dal mercato.
Others believe that opening a market for human organs would lead to an unfair distribution of organs… Allocating organs, at least in part, by ability to pay is often perceived as unfair… Monetary compensation to the donor could be arranged without the necessity of payment from the recipient, thereby avoiding this issue. But the counterargument of those who think that markets are unfair is that monetary compensation is the "thin edge of the wedge" that would eventually usher in monetary purchase….  Organs are treated like fish in a lake owned in common. Anyone is allowed to fish in the lake, but the decision to restock is private and voluntary.
Del resto oggi il donatore ha solo costi: difficile aumentarne il numero:
Anyone is allowed access to the supply, but contributing imposes private costs on signers of the organ donor card.'… The costs of signing an organ donor card are in part psychological-perhaps the potential donor does not want to think about his own mortality or suspects that donation will interfere with proper enjoyment of the afterlife.' More concretely, some potential donors fear that if they sign their cards and are involved in a life-threatening accident, they are less likely to be revived than nondonors…
Una soluzione che sembra superare in parte i problemi esposti potrebbe essere rappresentata dalla regola “no give no take”: se non doni non ricevi. In questo modo è possibile premiare i donatori imponendo un costo ai non donatori.
The traditional solution to a tragedy of the commons problem is to enclose or "privatize" the commons. In the case of transplantable human organs, this can be done by restricting organ transplants to those who previously agreed to be organ donors; in short, a "no-give, no-take" rule… At present, nonsigners face no costs to not signing their donor cards. The no-give, no-take rule raises the costs of not signing or, equivalently, increases the benefits of signing, and thus it will increase the number of organ donors… Children would be automatically eligible to receive organs until the age of sixteen, when they would have the option to sign their cards…
Il sistema ha qualche problema ma si puo’ rimediare:
To prevent people from signing after learning they were in need, there would be a mandatory waiting period of at least one year after the age of, say, 18 before the right to receive an organ took effect…
Il sistema comporta la morte di alcune persone che sarebbero sopravvissute col sistema attuale ma mi sembra una conseguenza moralmente accettabile anche per un cattolico.
The no-give, no-take rule may result in the deaths of some people who would have lived under the current rules. Thousands of people are dying today, however. If the no-give, no-take rule increases the number of potential donors, then fewer people will die on net. If enough people sign their donor cards, this plan could even produce a surplus of organs… Any remaining organs could then be allocated on the same basis to nonsigners…
In una versione più edulcorata potremmo dire che diventare donatori ci fa guadagnare qualche posizione nella fila d’attesa:
A more modest version of the no-give, no-take rule could be implemented by stating that, henceforth, points should also be awarded for previously having signed one's organ donor card.' It would then be allowable, for example, to give an organ to a nonsigner before giving it to a signer if the nonsigner had been on the waiting list for a long time…
Ripeto, il maggior vantaggio del sistema proposto è che supera gran parte delle obiezioni etiche avanzate, anche quelle di natura religiosa:
A considerable advantage of the no-give, no-take rule over organ markets is that far fewer moral qualms are raised… Although it is understandable that some people may have misgivings about becoming donors for personal or religious reasons, why should someone who was not willing to give an organ be allowed to take an organ?…
COMMENTO PERSONALE
Il mio saggio ideale: limpido, chiaro, non schierato (sebbene l’autore sia schierato, e questo lo posso dire esclusivamente per mia conoscenza personale). Ma soprattutto si prende atto delle posizioni contrapposte senza caricature proponendo una via di mezzo senza nascondere i problemi che restano insoluti. Insomma, leggere Alexander Tabarrok è consolante, fa persino sperare che gli economisti servano a qualcosa.
kid

giovedì 29 settembre 2016

Un mercato per gli organi umani

Con il sistema attuale di donazione la carenza di organi disponibili per i trapianti è sotto gli occhi di tutti, la gran parte dei malati in attesa di un rene attenderà invano. E’ questo il dato di fatto da cui parte Alexander Tabarrok per proporre la riforma contenuta in “The Organ Shortage”:
The current system for motivating the supply of human organs has failed to end the shortage. Thousands of people die every year while they wait helplessly for an organ transplant and thousands more will die in the next few years… Today, roughly 60,000 people are waiting for organ transplants, although less than 10,000 will become donors.
Già in passato molti economisti hanno affrontato il problema chiedendo di istituire un mercato degli organi:
… For many years, a number of economists and economics-minded lawyers have offered their solution to the crisis: remove the legal restrictions on the purchase and sale of human organs (Becker 1997; Epstein 1993, 1997; Cohen 1989; Pindyck and Rubinfeld 1998; Barnett, Blair & Kaserman (1996, this volume).' The economic argument is familiar. Just as rent controls create a shortage of rental apartments, government rules that outlaw the buying or selling of organs on the open market hold the price of organs at zero and make an organ shortage inevitable…
Senonché la soluzione è apparsa a molti “ripugnante” e respinta al mittente. Non c’è motivo di dubitare sulla veridicità di questo giudizio visto che tra gli scontenti ci sono anche alcune Associazioni di malati:
… Discomfort with organ sales is so strong that even some people who are desperately waiting for an organ are against allowing monetary compensation for donation. Many people feel that organ sales violate a moral intuition about the inalienability of the body…
Altri temono le diseguaglianze. Difficile arginare unb problema del genere senza perdere l’efficienza garantita dal mercato.
Others believe that opening a market for human organs would lead to an unfair distribution of organs… Allocating organs, at least in part, by ability to pay is often perceived as unfair… Monetary compensation to the donor could be arranged without the necessity of payment from the recipient, thereby avoiding this issue. But the counterargument of those who think that markets are unfair is that monetary compensation is the "thin edge of the wedge" that would eventually usher in monetary purchase….  Organs are treated like fish in a lake owned in common. Anyone is allowed to fish in the lake, but the decision to restock is private and voluntary.
Del resto oggi il donatore ha solo costi: difficile aumentarne il numero:
Anyone is allowed access to the supply, but contributing imposes private costs on signers of the organ donor card.'… The costs of signing an organ donor card are in part psychological-perhaps the potential donor does not want to think about his own mortality or suspects that donation will interfere with proper enjoyment of the afterlife.' More concretely, some potential donors fear that if they sign their cards and are involved in a life-threatening accident, they are less likely to be revived than nondonors…
Una soluzione che sembra superare in parte i problemi esposti potrebbe essere rappresentata dalla regola “no give no take”: se non doni non ricevi. In questo modo è possibile premiare i donatori imponendo un costo ai non donatori.
The traditional solution to a tragedy of the commons problem is to enclose or "privatize" the commons. In the case of transplantable human organs, this can be done by restricting organ transplants to those who previously agreed to be organ donors; in short, a "no-give, no-take" rule… At present, nonsigners face no costs to not signing their donor cards. The no-give, no-take rule raises the costs of not signing or, equivalently, increases the benefits of signing, and thus it will increase the number of organ donors… Children would be automatically eligible to receive organs until the age of sixteen, when they would have the option to sign their cards…
Il sistema ha qualche problema ma si puo’ rimediare:
To prevent people from signing after learning they were in need, there would be a mandatory waiting period of at least one year after the age of, say, 18 before the right to receive an organ took effect…
Il sistema comporta la morte di alcune persone che sarebbero sopravvissute col sistema attuale ma mi sembra una conseguenza moralmente accettabile anche per un cattolico.
The no-give, no-take rule may result in the deaths of some people who would have lived under the current rules. Thousands of people are dying today, however. If the no-give, no-take rule increases the number of potential donors, then fewer people will die on net. If enough people sign their donor cards, this plan could even produce a surplus of organs… Any remaining organs could then be allocated on the same basis to nonsigners…
In una versione più edulcorata potremmo dire che diventare donatori ci fa guadagnare qualche posizione nella fila d’attesa:
A more modest version of the no-give, no-take rule could be implemented by stating that, henceforth, points should also be awarded for previously having signed one's organ donor card.' It would then be allowable, for example, to give an organ to a nonsigner before giving it to a signer if the nonsigner had been on the waiting list for a long time…
Ripeto, il maggior vantaggio del sistema proposto è che supera gran parte delle obiezioni etiche avanzate, anche quelle di natura religiosa:
A considerable advantage of the no-give, no-take rule over organ markets is that far fewer moral qualms are raised… Although it is understandable that some people may have misgivings about becoming donors for personal or religious reasons, why should someone who was not willing to give an organ be allowed to take an organ?…
COMMENTO PERSONALE
Il mio saggio ideale: limpido, chiaro, non schierato (sebbene l’autore sia schierato, e questo lo posso dire esclusivamente per mia conoscenza personale). Ma soprattutto si prende atto delle posizioni contrapposte senza caricature proponendo una via di mezzo senza nascondere i problemi che restano insoluti. Insomma, leggere Alexander Tabarrok è consolante, fa persino sperare che gli economisti servano a qualcosa.
kid

martedì 13 settembre 2016

13 Patent buyouts di Michael Kremer

13 Read more at location 3505
Note: 13@@@@@@@@@@@@ Edit
Economic growth ultimately depends on the production of new ideas, but competitive markets do not provide appropriate incentives for the production of ideas.Read more at location 3506
Note: IMPORTANZA Edit
Historically, societies have used a wide variety of mechanisms to encourage production of ideas. Some, such as patents and copyrights, provide inventors with monopolies over goods produced using their ideas. Others, such as the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the synthetic fuels program, directly subsidize research.Read more at location 3507
Note: STRUMENTI Edit
Patents and copyrights create insufficient incentives for original research because inventors cannot fully capture consumer surplus or spillovers of their ideas to other researchers. Patents and copyrights also create static distortions from monopoly pricing and encourage socially wasteful expenditures on reverse engineering to invent around patents. Read more at location 3510
Note: DISTORSIONI Edit
before research is conducted, the government may not know the costs and expected benefits of research, and it may not even be able to conceive of some inventions. Allowing government officials wide discretion to set payments to inventors ex post may lead to rent seeking and to expropriation of investors after their research costs are sunk. Read more at location 3513
Note: DISTORSIONI RICERCA PUBBLIVA Edit
In 1839, the government of France combined elements of the patent system and of direct government support of research by purchasing the patent for daguerreotype photography and placing the technique in the public domain. After the patent was bought out, daguerreotype photography was rapidly adopted worldwide and was subject to myriad technical improvements.Read more at location 3515
Note: ALYERNATIVA. DAGHERROTIPO Edit
A major challenge for any system of patent buyouts is determining the price.Read more at location 3517
Note: L INCONVENIENTE Edit
government would offer to buy out patents at this private value times a fixed markup that would roughly cover the difference between the social and private values of inventions. Inventors could decide whether to sell or retain their patents.Read more at location 3518
Note: OFFERTA Edit
However, in order to provide auction participants with an incentive to truthfully reveal their valuations, the government would randomly select a few patents that would be sold to the highest bidder. Encouraging innovation through such a mechanism would require more discretion by government officials than the current patent system but substantially less discretion than that exercised by, say, the National Institutes of Health.Read more at location 3520
Note: ASTA Edit
Macfie (1869), a member of the British Parliament in the nineteenth century, proposed replacing the patent system with a reward system. In this century, Polanyi (1943) suggested replacing patents with rewards based on ex-post estimates of the value of inventions. Guell and Fischbaum (1995) suggest that the government use its power of eminent domain to purchase pharmaceutical patents. They propose that judges determine the buyout price. One problem with allowing broad administrative discretion over the patent buyout price is that this may lead to purchases at confiscatory prices and thus reduce incentives for innovation. Allowing broad discretion may also lead to wasteful expenditures on rent seeking,Read more at location 3523
Note: PRECEDENTI Edit
Note: CONFISCHE Edit
This chapter describes how a market mechanism could be used to determine the value of patents.Read more at location 3528
Patent buyouts would thus supplement, rather than replace, the existing patent system. Inventors would receive a markup over the private value of the patents to bring incentives for invention closer to the social value.Read more at location 3529
Note: REPLACE Edit
One problem with a fixed reward is that people could claim rewards for trivial inventions.Read more at location 3532
Note: TRIVIAL Edit
Perhaps the chief problem with patent buyouts is that they are potentially vulnerable to collusion, because inventors could bribe auction participants to submit high bids.Read more at location 3538
Note: COLLUSION Edit
VII. Preventing Collusion Read more at location 3751
Note: T Edit
patent holders would have an incentive to bribe auction participants to bid high.Read more at location 3751
Note: BRIBE Edit
It is impossible to eliminate collusion, but, as subsection VILA explains, a variety of mechanisms could be used to minimize collusion.Read more at location 3752
Note: MINIMIZZARE Edit
The government could make collusion more difficult using standard procedures such as requiring bids to be sealed, punishing companies and individuals found guilty of collusion, and rewarding whistle-blowers.Read more at location 3754
Note: 3 MODI Edit
The government would base the price it offers the inventor on the third highest bid. The original patent holder would therefore have to bribe three companies instead of one to ensure a substantial increase in the buyout price.Read more at location 3756
Note: TERZA OFFERTA PIÙ ALTA Edit
suppose that, based on the other bids and any knowledge of the industry, the government's best estimate of the patent's value was it. If a bidder offered it + x and the agency suspected collusion," the government could offer to buy out the patent at it + $1 and then require the suspected colluding bidder to purchase the patent at its bid of it + x. The government would make a profit of x - 1 from the attempted collusion.Read more at location 3759
Note: MARK UP Edit
The government could develop lists of suspect bidders by checking whether winning bidders made money,Read more at location 3762
Note: MESSA A FRUTTO Edit
bidders would have to provide information on any ties they had with the inventor.Read more at location 3763
Note: TRASPARENZA Edit
Bidders could be required to pay a licensing fee or deposit allowing them to participate in a number of auctions. This would make it unprofitable for patent holders to set up dummy companiesRead more at location 3764
Note: COSTI FISSI Edit
inventors would be prohibited from buying back the patent from the winning bidder or making other payments to bidders.Read more at location 3768
Note: BUY BACK Edit
VII.B. Ceiling Prices Read more at location 3773
Note: T Edit
there are several ways that governments could establish ceiling prices and thus reduce the risk of paying vastly inflated sums for patents.Read more at location 3774
Note: LIMITE VERSO L ALTO Edit
it is also important to remember that many institutions that are theoretically vulnerable to collusion operate relatively well. For example, peer review is highly vulnerable to collusion, yet the NSF and NIH seem relatively effective.Read more at location 3794
Note: PEER REVIEW Edit
Even if collusion raises patent prices above their social value, the social value of inventions may be approximated better by the collusive price than by the existing patent system,Read more at location 3798
Note: SPRECO INFERIORE Edit
The auction mechanism described in this chapter may be appropriate for many pharmaceuticals, but it would not be appropriate in industries where markets are too thin for auctions or patents are not an effective means of protecting inventions. In such industries, the government could simply offer to buy out patents for an amount equal to postbuyout sales times an administratively determined estimate of the average consumer surplus per unit of the good consumed. Read more at location 3802
Note: THIN Edit