“Do we want an arbitrary command-controlled economy or one that is open to innovation?”
Natural law allows for the freedom of individuals to own things and use them as they wish. Intellectual property is a type of artificially created negative right. The laws basically say that if someone invents something and registers that invention with the government, then no one under that government’s jurisdiction or the jurisdiction of foreign governments that agree by treaty, can use this invention without compensating the inventor during a period of time which is typically about 20 years.
So our governments have taken something from us in exchange for the hope that innovation will benefit everyone in the long run. This is perfectly Constitutional and under the purview of Congress.
However, today, inventions disproportionately benefit wealthy investors rather than inventors and the general public. And people like Bill Gates have learned how to manipulate the legal system to turn limited-term patents into perpetual monopolies. This was NEVER the intent of the founders.
The protection afforded by the limited monopolies of IP ought to generate a hefty amount of revenue to supplement and offset or entirely replace other sources of revenue the government receives (i.e. taxes). After all, a government of the people and by the people should represent the interests of those people first. Instead, taxes on labor and property are collected to subsidize the further enrichment of the wealthy who make their fortunes from intellectual property protections that borrow and/or steal natural rights of the citizens.
If the citizens cannot get fair compensation for their voluntary surrender of these natural rights, then we might as well do away with IP laws and make everything open source. Personally, I think IP laws CAN encourage innovation that we all benefit from, but we need for people to become more educated about how it should work to benefit us all.
The important thing to consider in the area of IP law is that taxing patented inventions is entirely different than taxing labor or other forms of property such as real property. I think taxes on real estate should be very low or non-existent, especially for homesteads that are merely places to live and raise families rather than conduct commercial business. Otherwise you really do not fully own such property. Taxing income that derives from work, discourages work. As a conservative, I am for lower but not non-existent taxes. It makes sense to place the lions share of the tax burden on those who profit from the IP laws that take natural rights away from free citizens.
Alternatively, cancel the IP laws. If someone invents robots that can replace humans for various jobs, then as a free citizen I will reverse engineer one and duplicate it many times. Then I will have an army of robot slaves to do as much of my work for me as I wish. And so will every other free citizen.
And if you (or I) don’t know how to do this, we will pay the free market (i.e. lowest) price for someone who can do this for us. People like Bill Gates do not need to own the rights to all of the robot technology.
I think I understand your argument and I’m not dismissing it. I really think it merits consideration. As I said before, I’m just worried about the government’s demonstrated tendency to spend beyond any revenue level, even if we assume greatly expanded revenue front taxing IP rights.