Edward Conard

Top Ten New York Times Bestselling Author

  • “…challenges misconceptions that distort our economic debates.” - Arthur Brooks, President of the American Enterprise Institute
  • “A full-throated defense of economic dynamism.” - The Wall Street Journal
  • “Unintended Consequences is full of substance, it is one of the must-read books of the year, and once I finish it I will be giving it a second read through right away.” - Tyler Cowen, Professor, George Mason University
  • “…a must-read for serious students of economic policy.” - Glenn Hubbard, Dean, Columbia Business School, and former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers
  • “There are an amazing number of good ideas and interesting points made in Unintended Consequences. The thinking underlying it, and the obvious depth of understanding of the author, are very impressive.” - Steven Levitt, coauthor of Freakonomics; 2004 John Bates Clark Medal
  • “…a comprehensive explanation of the modern economy.” - Julian Robertson, Founder, Tiger Management
  • “…a fresh argument for the productive value of inequality.” - David Autor, Professor of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • “…a comprehensive explanation of the modern economy.” - Julian Robertson, Founder, Tiger Management
  • “…a fresh argument for the productive value of inequality.” - David Autor, Professor of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • “Unintended Consequences is far smarter and more thought-provoking than most economics written for the general public” - Greg Mankiw, Harvard University, Former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors
  • “…reminds us that inequality sends a signal of what society lacks most, in America’s case, entrepreneurship and risk taking.” - Lawrence Lindsey, CEO, The Lindsey Group, former Director of the National Economic Council
  • “Unintended Consequences should be read by anyone who takes for granted the superiority of progressive taxation and has not thought carefully about the trade-offs involved.” - The New Republic
Upside of Inequality Oxford Unintended Consequences

AI Summary. A U.S. patent secrecy program placed secrecy orders on roughly 11,200 patent applications in war-critical fields such as radar and electronics; the authors find these orders reduced and delayed follow-on invention, restricted commercialization, and decreased entry into patenting.

Daniel Gross National Bureau of Economic Research
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Secrecy During WWII Reduced Commercialization/Diffusion Of Tech Change.

Does patent secrecy slow follow-on invention and commercialization?

Core argument: The USPTO's WWII patent secrecy program issued secrecy orders on roughly 11,200 U.S. patent applications, concentrated in technologies critical to the war effort such as radar and electronics.

During WWII, the USPTO's patent secrecy program issued secrecy orders on ~11,200 U.S. patent applications, primarily in areas critical to the war effort like radar and electronics. While effective at keeping technology out of the public domain, these orders reduced and delayed follow-on invention, restricted commercialization, and decreased patenting entry. This highlights the trade-off between protecting sensitive innovations and stifling technological progress. The ongoing debate over using secrecy to combat foreign IP theft reflects concerns about potentially stifling U.S. innovation and driving R&D abroad.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. The USPTO's WWII patent secrecy program issued secrecy orders on roughly 11,200 U.S. patent applications, concentrated in technologies critical to the war effort such as radar and electronics.
  2. Secrecy orders kept covered technologies out of the public domain but reduced and delayed follow-on invention, restricted commercialization, and decreased entry into patenting.
  3. The WWII program illustrates a trade-off between protecting sensitive innovations and stifling technological progress, a concern in the debate over using secrecy to combat foreign IP theft without driving U.S. R&D abroad.

NBER paper finds that secrecy during WWII reduced commercialization/diffusion of break thoughts, though the program was effective at keeping discoveries out of public domain

".....This paper studies the effects of the USPTO's patent secrecy program in World War II, under which approximately 11,200 U.S. patent applications were issued secrecy orders which halted examination and prohibited inventors from disclosing their inventions or filing in foreign countries. Secrecy orders were issued most heavily in areas important to the war effort — such as radar, electronics, and synthetic materials — and nearly all rescinded en masse at the end of the war. I find that compulsory invention secrecy was effective at keeping affected technology out of the public domain, but it appears to have reduced and delayed follow-on invention, reduced entry into patenting, and restricted commercialization. The results shed light on the consequences of invention secrecy, which is widely used by inventors to protect and appropriate the returns to innovation, and yield lessons for ongoing policy debates over potential measures to protect U.S. invention against the growing incidence of foreign IP theft today.... Secrecy orders are still issued today, under the authority of the Invention Secrecy Act of 1951, but at lower frequency than during the war.More recently, motivated by recurrent theft of U.S. IP by foreign firms and governments, the USPTO solicited public comments in 2012 about the feasibility of expanding secrecy orders to “economically significant” patents. The request for comments elicited strong negative reactions from several legal trade groups, whose concerns included some of the questions studied in this paper. As of yet it has not evolved into legislation or agency action, but policymakers continue to debate solutions to foreign IP theft and illegal technology transfer, which could conceivably include promoting, or imposing, invention secrecy. The focus of this paper is on the repercussions of concealing new invention. An important question this paper leaves for future research is the incentive effects of this policy: by suspending patent examination and precluding commercialization, secrecy orders may discourage subsequent patenting or invention in sensitive subject matter by those who receive them. Concerns about the detrimental impact on domestic invention, namely stifling U.S. innovation and driving R&D abroad, were among those raised by the ABA and IPOA in their responses to the USPTO’s 2012 request for comments. An answer to this question would complement existing literatures on both the incentive effects of intellectual property rights and the decision to patent...."

Daniel Gross, "The Consequences of Invention Secrecy: Evidence from the USPTO Patent Secrecy Program in World War II," National Bureau of Economic Research, February 2019, https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/19-090_0c1138eb-2518-48df-a05b-881d5183df0d.pdf

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