Intellectual property rights, market structure and social welfare : three essays in industrial organization

This dissertation consists of three essays on the effects of intellectual property rights protection on market structure and social welfare in the Indian pharamaceutical industry. In contrast to pharmaceutical industries in the developed world, India had historically enforced a weak system of intellectual property rights protection that eliminated most legal barriers to entry in its pharmaceuticals markets. As a condition of its membership to the World Trade Organization, India became required to extend legal protection to all pharmaceutical products by 2005. The first essay analyzes the dramatic increase in the number of products released by domestic firms in India in the period leading up to the 2005 deadline. Speculation in the media linked this phenomenon to the imminent change in patent regime. The essay uses data on pharmaceutical products being sold in India in combination with data on drugs patented internationally to investigate the possibility that Indian firms launched products in the domestic industry as a strategic response to the anticipated change implied by the WTO. Results of the estimation do not provide conclusive evidence of strategic behavior by firms in markets where the patent enforcement could affect the future profitability of domestic firms.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Economics.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2006

Author dc:creator

• Dutta, Antara

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Glenn Ellison and Nancy Rose.

• Economics.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/37413

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/37413