If promotion in a hierarchy is based on a random signal of ability, rates of promotion are affected by risk-taking. Further, the statistical properties of the surviving populations of risk-takers and non-risk-takers will be different, and will be changing throughout the hierarchy. I define...

Our objective in this paper is to review what economists have said about incentive schemes to promote R&D, including intellectual property. While we focus on environments in which other forms of protection are not available, we note that other protections can obviate the need for any formal...

Intellectual property treaties have two main types of provisions: national treatment of foreign inventors, and harmonization of protections. I characterize the circumstances in which countries would want to treat foreign inventors the same as national inventors. I then argue that national...

We investigate rewards to R&D in a model where substitute ideas for innovation arrive to random recipients at random times. By foregoing investment in a current idea, society as a whole preserves an option to invest in a better idea for the same market niche, but with delay. Because successive...

We consider a model of the innovative environment where there is a distinction between ideas for R\&D investments and the investments themselves. We investigate the optimal reward policy and how it depends on whether ideas are scarce or obvious. By foregoing investment in a current idea, society...

We consider a model of the innovative environment where there is a distinction between ideas for R&D investments and the investments themselves. We investigate the optimal reward policy and how it depends on whether ideas are scarce or obvious. By foregoing investment in a current idea, society...

JEL Classifications: L41, K21 Abstract: When infringement of a patent dissipates profit relative to the licensing agreement that would otherwise occur, damages under the lost-profit rule deter infringement, and otherwise not. We develop this point in a general model and give two examples....

JEL Classifications: L41, K21 Abstract: When infringement of a patent dissipates profit relative to the licensing agreement that would otherwise occur, damages under the lost-profit rule deter infringement, and otherwise not. We develop this point in a general model and give two examples....