The pharmaceutical industry is a textbook example of a science based sector characterized by high R&D cost, uncertain and spillovers for which patent protection assures appropriability thus providing incentives for innovation. Indeed, Mansfield (1986) found that, absent patent protection, 60...

This paper advances an argument in support of technologyspecific tailoring of incentives to innovate. With a focus on patent incentives, the argument proceeds from the identification of the factors likely to have a bearing on (a) the differential role and effectiveness of patents in different...

In the New Property Rights model ownership of assets should be assigned to the most capable agents. While, in a world of incomplete contracts, the application of the model to IPRs provides insights on the nature of their second best allocation, also the opposite direction of causation may arise:...