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Trends in Private Patent Costs and Rents for Publicly-Traded United States Firms
Get PDFWe use detailed data to estimate the private costs and private rents of United States patents for publicly-traded firms. In analyzing costs, we first introduce a novel theoretical model to interpret our estimates. We then combine lawsuit data from Derwent Litalert with non-practicing entity (NPE) lawsuits collected by Patent Freedom, and use an event-study approach to estimate losses suffered by alleged infringers during 1984-2009. To estimate rents, we combine patent data from the USPTO and EPO with financial data from COMPUSTAT, and use market-value regressions to estimate the value of patent rents for publicly-traded US firms during 1979-2002. We find that private costs exceed private rents during 1999-2000 and the trend in costs is sharply higher. Costs also exceed forecasts of rents for 2005-09. A surge in the number of NPE lawsuits contributes to the increase in the gap
Investigating the Politics of Legal Empirics: Possible Next Steps
No full textEmpirical investigation is necessary to build confidence in social science theories related to law. As Jeffrey Rachlinski (Rachlinski, 2018) points out, during the last couple of decades legal scholars have greatly increased their production of empirical legal studies. Data are more readily available and cheaper to gather. Empiricists continue to refine and improve the methods. Editors of both law reviews and peer-reviewed journals seem eager to publish empirical legal studies. Some blogs ,journals, and professional societies focus solely on such studies. It is a good time to be a legal empiricist
Taxing & Zapping Marijuana: Blockchain Compliance in the Trump Administration Part 4
Get PDFThis is the fourth of a five-part series dealing with the rescission by U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions of the Obama-era policy that discouraged federal prosecutors from bringing charges in all but the most serious marijuana cases.
This article focuses on retail-level frauds. It proposes a limited purpose crypto currency. At the retail level the MJ Freeway or METRC software essentially functions as a marijuana-industry-specific point of sale (POS) system. It is common in retail for different industry sectors (restaurants, hotels, convenience stores, or gasoline stations) to have market-specific POS systems that are molded to fit the unique characteristics of their trade.
The first marijuana-specific STS inventory management/ POS system was created by the co-founder of MJ Freeway.
This paper uses the State of Washington as a template for retail-level marijuana frauds. The State of Washington presents a classic example of where technology-based sales tax fraud is a known problem in cash-based businesses (notably restaurants). Washington also has, far and away, the highest tax on marijuana in the country, and Washington collects 47.3% of its revenue (not including local government taxes) from the retail sales tax. Technology has been the backbone of the State’s economy for years, and one would expect that ECR/POS system security measures would be mandatory and abundant. But, Washington has nothing.
The fraud that is discussed in this paper is carried out is with Zappers, Phantomware, SSaaS, and Dark Cloud functionality. The solution proposed is technology-intensive third-party security mandated by the State for each marijuana POS system. Modeled on the Quebec, Rwanda, or Fiji applications
Introduction to the Professor Robert Seidman Memorial Issue
No full textShortly after Professor Robert Seidman\u27s passing in 2014, I met up with my friend and colleague Professor Helen Xanthaki at an International Association of Legislation conference in Seoul, Korea. We talked about Bob\u27s enduring legacy in the worlds of legislative drafting and Law & Development, took turns telling stories about Bob and his wife Ann, and agreed that a law review issue dedicated to Bob\u27s memory and work would be a fitting tribute. Needless to say I was honoured when the editor of the European Journal of Law Reform, Dr. Constantin Stefanou, asked me to be the guest editor for this memorial edition
Lien on Me: Property Tax Delinquency Laws and Urban Inequality
No full texthttps://scholarship.law.bu.edu/clark_speakers/1092/thumbnail.jp
Insights into Early Stage of Antibiotic Development in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises: A Survey of Targets, Costs, and Durations
Get PDFAntibiotic innovation has dwindled to dangerously low levels in the past 30 years. Since resistance continues to evolve, this innovation deficit can have perilous consequences on patients. A number of new incentives have been suggested to stimulate greater antibacterial drug innovation. To design effective solutions, a greater understanding is needed of actual antibiotic discovery and development costs and timelines. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) undertake most discovery and early phase development for antibiotics and other drugs. This paper attempts to gather a better understanding of SMEs’ targets, costs, and durations related to discovery and early phase development of antibacterial therapies
Excavating Race-Based Disadvantage Among Class-Privileged People of Color
Get PDFThe aim of this article is to begin to theorize the fraught space within which class-privileged racial minorities exist — the disadvantage within their privilege. The article posits that the invisibility of the racial subordination of wealthier people of color (that is, their marginalization on account of their race) is fertile soil for the germination of post-racialism — the sense that we, as a nation, have overcome our racial problems. The dramatic visibility of the minority poor’s suffering, combined with the relative invisibility of the suffering of those minorities who are not poor, breeds the belief that class is now the main issue; it breeds the belief that class is the thing that really matters. If, as post-racialism suggests, class is the real problem, then we can, and ought to, dismantle any racial stratification that we witness through race-neutral, class-based means. But, if race remains a real problem — that is, if people and groups continue to be disadvantaged on account of their race — then the class-based mechanisms will not actually eliminate racial inequality. Thus, it is important for us to see the race-based disadvantage that class-privileged people of color endure in order to defeat post-racial thinking. The article demonstrates that the illegibility of the racial subordination of wealthier people of color is owed, in part, to our existing theories of racial discrimination. It shows that our theories of racial discrimination have led us to conceptualize economic disadvantage as constituting the entire universe of racial disadvantage. If economic disadvantage does, in fact, constitute the universe of racial disadvantage, then those who are not economically disadvantaged (i.e., wealthier people of color) have not been racially disadvantaged at all. However, the reality is that economic subordination is just one element of racial subordination. Racial discrimination has disadvantaged people of color not only economically, but also socioculturally and politically. Thus, if we are to bring visibility to the racial subordination that wealthier people of colorexperience — a visibility that may keep post-racial thinking at bay — then we have to theorize the noneconomic injuries that racial discrimination inflicts. This article begins this endeavor
Allocating Patent Litigation Risk Across the Supply Chain
Get PDFThe paradigmatic defendant in a patent lawsuit is a vertically integrated manufacturer. But much economic activity is conducted collaboratively by a supply chain of vertically disintegrated firms, and sometimes multiple firms are implicated in infringing activities, by making, selling, or using patented technology, or by contributing to or inducing another firm’s infringement. Often patent owners have the option of suing some or all of the members of a supply chain who contribute to the design, creation and marketing of a new technology./= / \u3e/= / \u3eBusinesses increasingly contemplate the risk of patent infringement when they negotiate contractual relations to form a supply chain. Upstream and downstream firms recognize they may be jointly liable for patent infringement because of their relationship to each other and their connection to the new product. An interesting and difficult question is: how should they manage infringement risk to maximize their joint profit? Which firm should control litigation? Or should they plan for joint control? Should they share responsibility for damages and litigation expenses? If yes, what determines each party’s share. This Article provides guidance regarding the choice of efficient terms in indemnification agreements that respond to two objectives: efficient risk management and effective bargaining against a patent-plaintiff
Serial Collusion by Multi-Product Firms
Get PDFWe provide empirical evidence that many multi-product firms have each participated in several cartels over the past 50 years. Standard analysis of cartel conduct, as well as enforcement policy, is rooted in the presumption that each cartel in which a given firm participates is a singular activity, independent of other cartel conduct by the firm. We argue that this analysis is deficient in many respects in the face of serial collusion by multi-product firms. We offer policy recommendations to reign in serial collusion, including a mandatory coordinated effects review for any merger involving a serial colluder, regardless of the apparent nature of the merger