JAMES WATT AS INTELLECTUAL MONOPOLIST: COMMENT ON BOLDRIN AND LEVINE

George Selgin and John Turner ()

International Economic Review, 2006, vol. 47, issue 4, 1341-1348

Abstract: In their 2003 Lawrence R. Klein Lecture, Michele Boldrin and David Levine argue that intellectual property rights may be damaging to social welfare. As empirical evidence for their theory they offer James Watt's steam engine patent, claiming that it delayed the Industrial Revolution by as much as two decades. We show that this claim, as well as the more general claim that Watt's story supports Boldrin and Levine's theory, rests upon a distorted summary of the historical record. Copyright 2006 by the Economics Department Of The University Of Pennsylvania And Osaka University Institute Of Social And Economic Research Association.

Date: 2006
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ier:iecrev:v:47:y:2006:i:4:p:1341-1348

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0020-6598

Access Statistics for this article

International Economic Review is currently edited by Harold L. Cole

More articles in International Economic Review from Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association 160 McNeil Building, 3718 Locust Walk, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6297. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley-Blackwell Digital Licensing () and ().