The Patent Office Could be to Blame for a US “Innovation Crisis�

Pat Choate, author of “Saving Capitalism From The Capitalists” and “Dangerous Business: The Risks of Globalization for America,” appears on Yahoo’s tech ticker to describe what he sees as America’s innovation crisis, a problem stemming from the massive backlog at the US Patent Office.

Here are a two of Choate's key points:

• Small businesses create 55% of all breakthrough technologies… and their patent approvals are becoming a rarity. Patents awarded to entrepreneurial individuals have dropped from roughly 18 percent of approvals in the ’80s and ’90s to about 5.3 percent last year.

• Many new technologies — about 1.2 million patent applications are in need of approval — are going obsolete as they are in the pipeline waiting for review. The process now takes about three years on average, a delay that stifles business innovation and subsequently slows job creation.

See the video below, which came to our attention via The Big Picture blog at this post.

The Patent Office Could be to Blame for a US “Innovation Crisis” originally appeared in the Daily Reckoning. The Daily Reckoning, offers a uniquely refreshing, perspective on the global economy, investing, gold, stocks and today's markets. Its been called "the most entertaining read of the day."