Dead Poets’ Property - How Does Copyright Influence Price

Xing Li (), Megan MacGarvie and Petra Moser
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Xing Li: Stanford University

No 14-001, Discussion Papers from Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: This paper exploits a differential increase in copyright under the UK Copyright Act of 1814 - in favor of books by dead authors – to examine the influence of longer copyrights on price. Difference-in-differences analyses, which compare changes in the price of books by dead and living authors, indicate a substantial increase in price in response to an extension in copyright length. By comparison, placebo regressions for books by dead authors that did not benefit from the extension indicate no differential increase. Historical evidence suggests that longer copyrights increase price by improving publishers’ ability to practice intertemporal price discrimination.

Keywords: Copyright; creativity; innovation; information goods; culture; intertemporal price discrimination. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K00 N33 O3 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cul, nep-his, nep-ino, nep-ipr and nep-pr~
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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http://www-siepr.stanford.edu/repec/sip/14-001.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Dead Poet's Property - How Does Copyright Influence Price? (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sip:dpaper:14-001

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