10-11-2010
, 08:42 PM
Top 1 Percent of Americans Reaped Two-Thirds of Income Gains in Last Economic Expansion
Income Concentration in 2007 Was at Highest Level Since 1928, New Analysis Shows
Who did this :
The Share of USA Income gains Going to the Top 1 Percent at Highest Level Since 1920.
1923 to 1929 was 70% to the Richest
1960 to 1969 was 11% to the Richest
1976 to 1979 was 33% to the Richest
1982 to 1989 was 41% to the Richest
1992 to 2000 was 42% to the Richest
2002 to 2007 was 62% to the Richest
…………………………………………………
The Share of USA Income gains Going to the Bottom 90 Percent at the Lowest Level Since 1920.
1923 to 1929 was 18% to the Poorest
1960 to 1969 was 62% to the Poorest
1976 to 1979 was 43% to the Poorest
1982 to 1989 was 22% to the Poorest
1992 to 2000 was 29% to the Poorest
2002 to 2007 was 12% to the Poorest
Who did this?
Income Concentration in 2007 Was at Highest Level Since 1928, New Analysis Shows
Quote:
Two-thirds of the nation’s total income gains from 2002 to 2007 flowed to the top 1 percent of U.S. households, and that top 1 percent held a larger share of income in 2007 than at any time since 1928, according to an analysis of newly released IRS data by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez.[1]
During those years, the Piketty-Saez data also show, the inflation-adjusted income of the top 1 percent of households grew more than ten times faster than the income of the bottom 90 percent of households.
The last economic expansion began in November 2001 and ended in December 2007, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, which means the Piketty-Saez data essentially cover that expansion. The last time such a large share of the income gain during an expansion went to the top 1 percent of households — and such a small share went to the bottom 90 percent of households — was in the 1920s (see Figure 1)
During those years, the Piketty-Saez data also show, the inflation-adjusted income of the top 1 percent of households grew more than ten times faster than the income of the bottom 90 percent of households.
The last economic expansion began in November 2001 and ended in December 2007, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, which means the Piketty-Saez data essentially cover that expansion. The last time such a large share of the income gain during an expansion went to the top 1 percent of households — and such a small share went to the bottom 90 percent of households — was in the 1920s (see Figure 1)
Who did this :
The Share of USA Income gains Going to the Top 1 Percent at Highest Level Since 1920.
1923 to 1929 was 70% to the Richest
1960 to 1969 was 11% to the Richest
1976 to 1979 was 33% to the Richest
1982 to 1989 was 41% to the Richest
1992 to 2000 was 42% to the Richest
2002 to 2007 was 62% to the Richest
…………………………………………………
The Share of USA Income gains Going to the Bottom 90 Percent at the Lowest Level Since 1920.
1923 to 1929 was 18% to the Poorest
1960 to 1969 was 62% to the Poorest
1976 to 1979 was 43% to the Poorest
1982 to 1989 was 22% to the Poorest
1992 to 2000 was 29% to the Poorest
2002 to 2007 was 12% to the Poorest
Who did this?
Spoiler:
10-11-2010
, 08:43 PM
10-12-2010
, 08:24 AM
Quote:
How Intellectual Property Hampers Capitalism | Stephan Kinsella
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWShFz4d2RY
Presented by Stephan Kinsella at the 2010 Mises Institute Supporters Summit: "The Economic Recovery: Washington's Big Lie." Recorded in Auburn, Alabama; 8 October 2010.
---
One of his better talks about it imo. (beginning regarding the history was very solid, ending could have been better)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWShFz4d2RY
Presented by Stephan Kinsella at the 2010 Mises Institute Supporters Summit: "The Economic Recovery: Washington's Big Lie." Recorded in Auburn, Alabama; 8 October 2010.
---
One of his better talks about it imo. (beginning regarding the history was very solid, ending could have been better)
10-12-2010
, 09:58 AM
10-12-2010
, 10:34 AM
10-12-2010
, 11:33 AM
http://mises.org/store/Against-Intel...poly-P552.aspx
random IP link dump:
http://mises.org/daily/3682
http://aaeblog.com/2010/05/20/bye-bye-for-ip/
http://mises.org/daily/4601
http://blog.mises.org/13442/leveraging-ip/
http://blog.mises.org/11725/iona-college-on-ip/
http://www.bastiatinstitute.org/2010...ging%E2%80%9D/
http://www.dailypaul.com/node/140352
random IP link dump:
http://mises.org/daily/3682
http://aaeblog.com/2010/05/20/bye-bye-for-ip/
http://mises.org/daily/4601
http://blog.mises.org/13442/leveraging-ip/
http://blog.mises.org/11725/iona-college-on-ip/
http://www.bastiatinstitute.org/2010...ging%E2%80%9D/
http://www.dailypaul.com/node/140352
10-12-2010
, 03:05 PM
10-12-2010
, 03:22 PM
10-13-2010
, 03:39 AM
Quote:
http://mises.org/store/Against-Intel...poly-P552.aspx
random IP link dump:
http://mises.org/daily/3682
http://aaeblog.com/2010/05/20/bye-bye-for-ip/
http://mises.org/daily/4601
http://blog.mises.org/13442/leveraging-ip/
http://blog.mises.org/11725/iona-college-on-ip/
http://www.bastiatinstitute.org/2010...ging%E2%80%9D/
http://www.dailypaul.com/node/140352
random IP link dump:
http://mises.org/daily/3682
http://aaeblog.com/2010/05/20/bye-bye-for-ip/
http://mises.org/daily/4601
http://blog.mises.org/13442/leveraging-ip/
http://blog.mises.org/11725/iona-college-on-ip/
http://www.bastiatinstitute.org/2010...ging%E2%80%9D/
http://www.dailypaul.com/node/140352
Damn you J. R.
I had things to do.
This is an area I haven't given much thought to and now I have to. I've read the links and will dive into the book later. I understand the basic logical arguments, but I am still trying to get my head around a world without IP. I can easily see a world without patents, and can vaguely picture one without copyrights. Trademarks on the other hand are my biggest concern. It seems like this would create a huge information problem and I have no idea how it would be overcome.
If I have heard that Bob makes great widgets, how can I buy one of Bob's widgets unless I buy it directly from Bob himself? How can Bob ever build his widget company if he has to personally sell each widget?
It is very cool that the authors of the book make it available for free download.
10-13-2010
, 09:11 AM
Quote:
I can easily see a world without patents, and can vaguely picture one without copyrights. Trademarks on the other hand are my biggest concern. It seems like this would create a huge information problem and I have no idea how it would be overcome.
If I have heard that Bob makes great widgets, how can I buy one of Bob's widgets unless I buy it directly from Bob himself? How can Bob ever build his widget company if he has to personally sell each widget?
If I have heard that Bob makes great widgets, how can I buy one of Bob's widgets unless I buy it directly from Bob himself? How can Bob ever build his widget company if he has to personally sell each widget?
Agency law, or the ability to hire people to work on your behalf, is different. Bob can hire people to help, he just can't sue people who make knock-offs for trademark.
Quote:
From what I've seen, it is clear to most activist-opponents of IP that copyright and patent are terrible. But it is not so clear what is wrong with other types of IP, such as trade secret and trademark. ....
Trademark
So we come to trademark. I deal with this on pp. 58-59 of Against Intellectual Property, and also in some detail in Reply to Van Dun: Non-Aggression and Title Transfer (esp. pp. 59-63). In my view, the new-fangled extensions of trademark law--rights against "trademark dilution" and cybersquatting, etc.--are obviously invalid. Further, federal trademark law is problematic since it is not authorized in the Constitution (copyright and patent are, but not trademark; trademark relies on the Interstate Commerce Clause, and thus the federal trademark law only covers trademark connected to interstate commerce, and does not preempt state law, so that state trademark law still governs many intra-state situations).
But even if federal trademark law were abolished, as well as modern extensions such as rights against trademark dilution, even common law trademark is problematic, for three primary reasons. First, it is enforced by the state, which gets everything wrong. Second (see First), the test of "consumer confusion" is usually applied ridiculously, treating consumers like indiscriminating idiots. Third, and worst of all, the right at issue is the right of the defrauded consumer, not the competitor. Trademark law ought to be reformed by abolishing the right of trademark "owners" to sue "infringers" (except perhaps as proxy for customers, when consent can be presumed or proved), and treating this as a case of the customer's right to sue a vendor who defrauds him as to the nature of the good purchased. Some might argue that this is only a minor change, but it is not: such a change would make it clear that "knockoffs" are usually not a violation of anyone's rights: the buyer of a $10 "Rolex" is almost never defrauded--he knows what he's getting. Yet by giving an enforceable trademark right to the user of a mark, he can sue knockoff companies even though their customers are not defrauded and in fact are perfectly happy to buy the knockoff products.
By the way, examples of trademark abuse are legion. It's not only copyright and patent that give rise to outrageous examples of injustice. See, e.g., Chip Wood, A Bully-Boy Beer Brewer; Justin Levine, 9th Circuit Appeals Court Says Its Ok To Criticize Trademarks After All, Against Monopoly (09/26/2007); Kinsella, Trademarks and Free Speech, Mises Blog (Aug. 8, 2007); Kinsella, Beemer must be next... (BMW, Trademarks, and the letter "M"), Mises Blog (Mar. 20, 2007); Kinsella, Hypocritical Apple (Trademark), Mises Blog (Jan. 11, 2007); ECJ: "Parmesian" Infringes PDO for "Parmigiano Reggiano", I/P Updates (Feb. 27, 2008); Engadget Mobile Threatened For Using T-Mobile's Trademarked Magenta, Techdirt (Mar. 31, 2008).
Now IP proponents often assume trademark law is unproblematic, and then try to lump types of IP together, so that they stand or fall together. For example it could be argued that if you are for reputation, then you must be for trademark; and if you are for trademark, you must be for "intellectual property"; and thus, you cannot be opposed to IP in principle, so you cannot oppose copyright and patent. (See, e.g., the comments here, making this argument.)
Now one fallacy of this argument is that it relies on the positive law conceptual grouping of different areas of artificial, legislated law to make its point. But there is no reason one has to favor the validity of copyright or patent law, even if one supported trademark law, say. Each has different defects and a different nature.
The other fallacy is the view at work here that there is no such thing as reputation, or even identity, absent trademark law. But this is incorrect. Of course people and firms can have reputations even if trademark law is nonexistent. All that is required is that people be able to identify other people and firms, and communicate. Pro-trademark arguments often implicitly assume that this is not possible, absent state-enforced trademark law, which is ridiculous. For example, how can there be fraud (as in my theory), if the vendor is free to call himself whatever he wants? What if Joe Schmoe sets up a knockoff McDonald's restaurant? Well, it is McDonald's--that's what it calls itself, and the "real" McDonald's can't stop it without trademark rights--so why is it fraud? Well, because the consumer is (per assumption) deceived as to the nature of the goods he is buying. As I argued in Reply to Van Dun (pp. 62-63),
"this response would be easy to overcome. It need only be possible for the customer to adequately identify what the condition is. Language is not infinitely malleable, and communication is (undeniably) possible. If pressed, the customer could specify that the purchase is conditioned on the current store he is in being owned by the same [McDonald's] company first started at such and such date and address, and so on. There is no reason it would be impossible to identify a given vendor without traditional trademark law, just as it is not impossible to identify fellow humans, despite the fact that we do not usually have trademarks on our names (in fact often have identical names, e.g. John Smith).
The other thing to realize is that consumers are not stupid. They can spot a knockoff easily. And the trademark frauds are usually going to be marginal low-life types, who could never compete with a legitimate business anyway--the kind of company that makes knockoff Rolexes, which doesn't fool its customers.
Consider. You have a successful burger joint, let's call it "Tommy's." Now, suppose they have no trademark, and other Tommy's pop up. So if you want the original Tommy's, where do you go? You go to the original Tommy's. Which just calls itself The Original Tommy's. (A similar phenomenon is in Twitter, where some well-known people and celebrities' names are taken, like dvorak--so John Dvorak just goes by "THErealDVORAK". End of problem. No anti-Twittersquatting law needed.)
If some other Tommy's tries to deceive customers into thinking it's owned by the same guy that owns the original Tommy's, then they are eventually going to get sued. Or have only marginal customers as people figure out this new place is run by seedy liars.
The truth is that any legitimate businessman wants to use a unique name. Just like people manage to distinguish their identities, even when they have the same names.
Trademark
So we come to trademark. I deal with this on pp. 58-59 of Against Intellectual Property, and also in some detail in Reply to Van Dun: Non-Aggression and Title Transfer (esp. pp. 59-63). In my view, the new-fangled extensions of trademark law--rights against "trademark dilution" and cybersquatting, etc.--are obviously invalid. Further, federal trademark law is problematic since it is not authorized in the Constitution (copyright and patent are, but not trademark; trademark relies on the Interstate Commerce Clause, and thus the federal trademark law only covers trademark connected to interstate commerce, and does not preempt state law, so that state trademark law still governs many intra-state situations).
But even if federal trademark law were abolished, as well as modern extensions such as rights against trademark dilution, even common law trademark is problematic, for three primary reasons. First, it is enforced by the state, which gets everything wrong. Second (see First), the test of "consumer confusion" is usually applied ridiculously, treating consumers like indiscriminating idiots. Third, and worst of all, the right at issue is the right of the defrauded consumer, not the competitor. Trademark law ought to be reformed by abolishing the right of trademark "owners" to sue "infringers" (except perhaps as proxy for customers, when consent can be presumed or proved), and treating this as a case of the customer's right to sue a vendor who defrauds him as to the nature of the good purchased. Some might argue that this is only a minor change, but it is not: such a change would make it clear that "knockoffs" are usually not a violation of anyone's rights: the buyer of a $10 "Rolex" is almost never defrauded--he knows what he's getting. Yet by giving an enforceable trademark right to the user of a mark, he can sue knockoff companies even though their customers are not defrauded and in fact are perfectly happy to buy the knockoff products.
By the way, examples of trademark abuse are legion. It's not only copyright and patent that give rise to outrageous examples of injustice. See, e.g., Chip Wood, A Bully-Boy Beer Brewer; Justin Levine, 9th Circuit Appeals Court Says Its Ok To Criticize Trademarks After All, Against Monopoly (09/26/2007); Kinsella, Trademarks and Free Speech, Mises Blog (Aug. 8, 2007); Kinsella, Beemer must be next... (BMW, Trademarks, and the letter "M"), Mises Blog (Mar. 20, 2007); Kinsella, Hypocritical Apple (Trademark), Mises Blog (Jan. 11, 2007); ECJ: "Parmesian" Infringes PDO for "Parmigiano Reggiano", I/P Updates (Feb. 27, 2008); Engadget Mobile Threatened For Using T-Mobile's Trademarked Magenta, Techdirt (Mar. 31, 2008).
Now IP proponents often assume trademark law is unproblematic, and then try to lump types of IP together, so that they stand or fall together. For example it could be argued that if you are for reputation, then you must be for trademark; and if you are for trademark, you must be for "intellectual property"; and thus, you cannot be opposed to IP in principle, so you cannot oppose copyright and patent. (See, e.g., the comments here, making this argument.)
Now one fallacy of this argument is that it relies on the positive law conceptual grouping of different areas of artificial, legislated law to make its point. But there is no reason one has to favor the validity of copyright or patent law, even if one supported trademark law, say. Each has different defects and a different nature.
The other fallacy is the view at work here that there is no such thing as reputation, or even identity, absent trademark law. But this is incorrect. Of course people and firms can have reputations even if trademark law is nonexistent. All that is required is that people be able to identify other people and firms, and communicate. Pro-trademark arguments often implicitly assume that this is not possible, absent state-enforced trademark law, which is ridiculous. For example, how can there be fraud (as in my theory), if the vendor is free to call himself whatever he wants? What if Joe Schmoe sets up a knockoff McDonald's restaurant? Well, it is McDonald's--that's what it calls itself, and the "real" McDonald's can't stop it without trademark rights--so why is it fraud? Well, because the consumer is (per assumption) deceived as to the nature of the goods he is buying. As I argued in Reply to Van Dun (pp. 62-63),
"this response would be easy to overcome. It need only be possible for the customer to adequately identify what the condition is. Language is not infinitely malleable, and communication is (undeniably) possible. If pressed, the customer could specify that the purchase is conditioned on the current store he is in being owned by the same [McDonald's] company first started at such and such date and address, and so on. There is no reason it would be impossible to identify a given vendor without traditional trademark law, just as it is not impossible to identify fellow humans, despite the fact that we do not usually have trademarks on our names (in fact often have identical names, e.g. John Smith).
The other thing to realize is that consumers are not stupid. They can spot a knockoff easily. And the trademark frauds are usually going to be marginal low-life types, who could never compete with a legitimate business anyway--the kind of company that makes knockoff Rolexes, which doesn't fool its customers.
Consider. You have a successful burger joint, let's call it "Tommy's." Now, suppose they have no trademark, and other Tommy's pop up. So if you want the original Tommy's, where do you go? You go to the original Tommy's. Which just calls itself The Original Tommy's. (A similar phenomenon is in Twitter, where some well-known people and celebrities' names are taken, like dvorak--so John Dvorak just goes by "THErealDVORAK". End of problem. No anti-Twittersquatting law needed.)
If some other Tommy's tries to deceive customers into thinking it's owned by the same guy that owns the original Tommy's, then they are eventually going to get sued. Or have only marginal customers as people figure out this new place is run by seedy liars.
The truth is that any legitimate businessman wants to use a unique name. Just like people manage to distinguish their identities, even when they have the same names.
===============
10-13-2010
, 12:02 PM
10-13-2010
, 01:58 PM
10-13-2010
, 06:01 PM
10-13-2010
, 06:57 PM
10-13-2010
, 08:00 PM
10-13-2010
, 08:37 PM
10-13-2010
, 09:51 PM
10-14-2010
, 02:20 AM
10-14-2010
, 06:32 AM
