From Farren Noel Hayden; This. A thousand times. I dont care if you invented the telephone. What really happened is that you pushed your patent through on the same day that another inventor tried to patent a working model and several other people around the world were close to independently inventing it, then relied on IP laws with questionable parameters to enforce monopoly. Just a frinstance, but a true story (google Elisha Gray) and a good example of how we have fostered myths about the excessive and asymmetric rewards an unchecked market dispenses. Im not hostile to markets, but I am hostile to the idea that, with inheritance, broken IP regimes, opportunities for rent-seeking and coercion of those not even getting a square meal every day, any right-thinking person could claim markets are optimal engines for the fair and efficient distribution of resources and that governments only function should be to enforce contracts. NO ONE ever contributed $ 1 billion in material value to society through their sole effort. If you own that much, most of it is stolen from other people who are being short-changed for their actual work.
Posted on: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 08:34:40 +0000
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