Seminarios del IPP: “The Cost of Copyright: Comparative Empirical Findings”

Lun, 15-11-2021; 00:00
Sede CCHS

Por Paul J Heald (Hanken-Fullbright Distinguished Chair Hanken School of Economics, Helsinki)

Sala María Zambrano 0C9 y online a través de Zoom (enlace - ID de reunión: 846 2442 2376- Código de acceso: 284524)

Organiza: Francisco Herreros (IPP-CSIC)

Abstract: The EU and United States encourage countries around the world to expand the term of copyright protection and to offer protection beyond that required by international conventions.  Empirical studies, however, suggest that the cost of increasing copyright protection is significantly outweighed by its costs.  Professor Heald presents data from book markets in the US, UK, Canada, South Africa, Sweden, and Finland that show copyright protection is associated with the diminished availability of books, higher prices, and fewer derivative works like audio books and translations.  He concludes that the story of modern copyright is rent seeking for private gain entailing significant public welfare losses

Paul J. Helad is Hanken-Fullbright Distinguished Chair, Hanken School of Economics (Helsinki), Albert J. Harno & Edward W. Clearly Chair in Law, College of Law, University of Illinois, and Fellow and Associate Researcher, University of Glasgow. He  lectures on copyright, patent, and international intellectual property law around the world and has previously held visiting positions at universities in Buenos Aires, Bournemouth, London, Lyon, Regensburg, and at the University of Chicago, University of Texas, and Vanderbilt University. He also administered the UGA/OSU program at St. Anne’s College, Oxford University, during the spring of 2009. He was Herbert Smith Visitor at Cambridge University in 2012.  He spent much of 2018 as an Erskine Fellow in the Economics Department of the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand, and as a Research Fellow at the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study in South Africa. Recent publications have focused on economic aspects of the public domain, and theoretical papers on optimal patent remedies, the role transaction costs in patent law, and the problem of patent pricing as well as empirical studies on best-selling fiction and musical compositions and the behavior of famous trademarks in product and service markets. He has also written two books on law and literature, and four novels, Death in Eden (2014), Cotton (2016) (selected as an Okra Pick by the Southern Booksellers’ Association), and Courting Death (2016), and Raggedyland (2020).

Seminarios del IPP: “The Cost of Copyright: Comparative Empirical Findings”
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Ciudadanos e Instituciones (CIP)