Home / Library / Ideas Are Not Scarce

Notable Quote

"Ideas are not naturally scarce. However, by recognizing a right in an ideal object, one creates scarcity where none existed before."

— Kinsella, Stephan

Context: From Against Intellectual Property (Mises Institute, 2008), the book's central insight, property rights exist to resolve conflicts over scarce resources, but ideas can be copied without depriving anyone, so granting IP rights manufactures an artificial scarcity enforced by the state

Topics

key Property Rights person Individual Rights analytics Economics gavel Law policy Libertarianism