Market failure

I was chatting with a right wing think tank member… a thunker… and I suddenly realised their mantra.

It is couched under the terms of free markets but basically they believe that government macro policy should only be introduced that addresses ‘market failure’.

As an aside micro policy is all about putting more money into their pockets and this is ok.

Back to market failure.

We were discussing the so called Patent Box system which in a few countries give companies an extra tax discount for products protected by patents.

The thunker said there is no market failure in the patent system or related corporate investment in innovation and that the patent box is therefore unnecessary.

I countered that the same could have been argued before the patent system itself was introduced. It’s not about correcting market failures but about creating market success.

The thunker was very confused. And remains so.