The authors are grateful to Karin Hoisl, Paul Jensen, Keld Laursen, Laura Toschi, Nicolas van Zeebroeck and two anonymous referees, as well as the Editor for useful comments. This paper has benefitted from comments of the audience of various seminars and conferences including the 4th EPIP conference (Bologna), the 98th AEA conference (Tokyo) and the DRUID-DIME Winter 2009 PhD conference (Aalborg). Gaetan gratefully acknowledges financial support from the FRS-FNRS.
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On the Price Elasticity of Demand for Patents†
Article first published online: 4 MAY 2011
DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0084.2011.00638.x
© Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the Department of Economics, University of Oxford, 2011
Additional Information
How to Cite
Rassenfosse, G. d. and Potterie, B. v. P. d. l. (2012), On the Price Elasticity of Demand for Patents. Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, 74: 58–77. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-0084.2011.00638.x
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Publication History
- Issue published online: 4 JAN 2012
- Article first published online: 4 MAY 2011
- Final Manuscript Received: December 2010
- Abstract
- Article
- References
- Cited By
Keywords:
- O30;
- O31;
- O38;
- O57
Abstract
This paper provides an analysis of the impact of patent fees on the demand for patents. It presents a dataset of fees since 1980 at the European (EPO), the US and the Japanese patent offices. Descriptive statistics show that fees have severely decreased at the EPO over the 1990s, converging towards the level of fees in the US and Japan. The estimation of dynamic panel data models suggests that the price elasticity of demand for patents is about −0.30. These results suggest that the laxity of fee policy at the EPO has significantly contributed to the rising propensity to patent.