The Wright Brothers and Patents on This Day in History

 

Today in History: The Wright brothers make the 1st sustained motorized aircraft flight at 10:35 AM on this day in 1903 at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. But how much of what the Wright Brothers did led to the first airplane? 

"It is because of patent-based historiography that people believe that the Wright Brothers invented the airplane, when in fact they made only a tiny contribution of combining wing warping with a rudder. It was Sir George Cayley in Britain and Otto Lilienthal of Germany who did the bulk of the work of inventing the airplane. But it was the Wright Brothers who applied for the patent and quickly used it against Glenn Curtiss who improved wing warping with movable control surfaces." Jeffrey Tucker

The Wright brothers were so litigious with their patent that it stifled plane innovation in America. During this time the French picked up the slack and airplane technology advanced under them. In fact, when the USA entered World War 1 they had to use French planes. Many have since argued against intellectual property rights as they tend to harm new technology, economic activity, and societal wealth.

In 1851, The Economist wrote: “The granting [of] patents ‘inflames cupidity’, excites fraud, stimulates men to run after schemes that may enable them to levy a tax on the public, begets disputes and quarrels betwixt inventors, provokes endless lawsuits . . . The principle of the law from which such consequences flow cannot be just.”

Henry V. Poor and the S&P 500 on This Day in History

 

Today in History: Henry Varnum Poor was born on this day in 1812. Poor was a financial analyst and founder of H.V. and H.W. Poor Co, which later became the financial research and analysis bellwether, Standard & Poor's, or if you will, the S&P 500. The S&P 500 is a stock market index that measures the stock performance of 500 large companies listed on stock exchanges in the United States. It is one of the most commonly followed equity indices. The 10 largest companies in the index are Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, Alphabet(class A & C), Berkshire Hathaway, Johnson & Johnson, JPMorgan Chase and Visa Inc. The components that have increased their dividends in 25 consecutive years are known as the S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats. It was only recently that AT&T, General Electric and ExxonMobil were in that top 10.

Tesla's stock will be added to the S&P 500 later this month. To be eligible for S&P 500 index inclusion, a company should be a U.S. company, have a market capitalization of at least USD 8.2 billion, the public float must consist of at least 50% of outstanding shares. It must have positive reported earnings in the most recent quarter, as well as over the four most recent quarters and the stock must have an active market and must trade for a reasonable share price.

State Licensing on This Day in History

Today in History: London becomes the world's first city to host licensed taxicabs on this day in 1897. This makes you think: what is a license, really? "What does a business license accomplish? Well, I guess it proves that you're seriously in business, although in most cities you can't be in business without one. So it's outright extortion, like property taxes, going to fund city government services that you didn't want anyway. Police? Well, maybe you do want police protection of your property, but police won't go near a riot and they're always too busy elsewhere, so you'll have to pay extra to hire your own." Robert Klassen

Why do you have a license on your car when the manufacturer has already placed a number on your car? This is so the government can track you, and they also want the fee a license costs. "The fee, of course, goes to support a state bureaucracy consisting of bored and indifferent individuals who are only working there for the wages and benefits and who couldn't care less about their career, if you can call it that." ibid

According to a 2015 White House report, "By one estimate, licensing restrictions cost millions of jobs nationwide and raise consumer expenses by over one hundred billion dollars...Consumers are likely most familiar with licensing requirements for professionals like dentists, lawyers, and physicians, but today licensing requirements extend to a very broad set of workers," including auctioneers, scrap metal recyclers, barbers, manicurists, eyebrow threaders, and tour guides. This means that an ever-growing share of jobs "are only accessible to those with the time and means to complete what are often lengthy"—not to mention expensive—licensing requirements, while the penalties for working without a license can include job loss, fines, and even incarceration.

Perhaps we need to be more like cats. You have to license your dog, but not your cat. Cats refuse to be licensed. They are too independent, stubborn, stuck-up and disobedient.