Source of Economic Growth

Author, Dale B. Halling ISBN 9781511829687 100 pages

The primary thesis of the book is an under-appreciated and often overlooked driver of prosperity and
improvement of the general welfare. That is Intellectual property rights. Without the protection and
capacity to profit from one's innovations there would be little incentive to share labor saving devices with
one's fellow man. These devices, which are the product of one's mind have been protected, thus fostering the
dissemination, manufacturing and widespread implementation.

In order that a society have an improving standard of living and avoid subsistence living, or worse, it is critical
that one profit from not only the labor of one's hands but also of their mind. It is the innovations of man that
have thus far fostered the increased supply of goods and reduction of costs to the consumer. This has improved the
real world wealth and quality of living for all. The capacity to protect one's innovations and profit from them has
been the incentive to invent, improve, manufacture and share.

Imagine a world without modern agricultural equipment or information age technology we all take for granted today.
It would be impossible to sustain the present population and those of us that did live would live hand to mouth; except
of course our feudal lords who would live well at the expense of others. That is the world we would return to.

The book is well written, contains historical data correlating and supporting the premise that the nation with the
highest degree of protection for property of all kinds, with an emphasis on intellectual property has the advantage
over other nations when it comes to the prosperity of its citizens. The arguments of the detractors are addressed with
convincing counter arguments and examples. The author, himself an expert in the field, has gathered together
the data and conclusions of other experts to demonstrate with exacting clarity the importance and value of
a strong patent and copyright system to human advancement.

There is no other path. We must move forward with innovation. We must protect it and foster it, or we as a race
will be reduced to a primitive time caught in the Malthusian trap. It is only our unequaled capacity to be tool makers
and inventors that has allowed us to move beyond it. Despite all the outcry of unequal distribution of wealth
the poor are not as poor as they would be if we did not encourage the entrepreneur and inventor. It is the promise of
profit from one's mental labor that has done this. The man whose work is honorable, but only manual, such as pulling a few
levers of a machine repeatedly on a factory floor owes a greater debt for his job and prosperity to all of those that made the
machine possible. It is not the other way around.

I enjoyed this quick read and consider it a handy and invaluable reference book in my library. I hope you will also.

Happy reading,
O.A.