The key to economic growth: Stealing

In the 19th century Germany caught up with England by ignoring copyright. China in the 21st: Ditto

By Andrew Leonard
Salon.com

Der Spiegel alerts us to important news:

Sigismund Hermbstadt ... a chemistry and pharmacy professor in Berlin, who has long since disappeared into the oblivion of history, earned more royalties for his "Principles of Leather Tanning" published in 1806 than British author Mary Shelley did for her horror novel "Frankenstein," which is still famous today.

The explanation for this tidbit may at first seem counterintuitive. In the first half of the 19th century, reports Der Spiegel, relying on the research of economic historian Eckhard Hoffner, Germany paid little attention to copyright law, in sharp contrast to Great Britain. The result, argues Hoffner, was a tremendous increase in the amount of published materials, particularly regarding scientific and technical knowledge, made available to the German public. Less regard for intelletectual property translated into a bigger market for producers of content.

In Germany... publishers had plagiarizers -- who could reprint each new publication and sell it cheaply without fear of punishment -- breathing down their necks. Successful publishers were the ones who took a sophisticated approach in reaction to these copycats and devised a form of publication still common today, issuing fancy editions for their wealthy customers and low-priced paperbacks for the masses.

This created a book market very different from the one found in England. Bestsellers and academic works were introduced to the German public in large numbers and at extremely low prices. "So many thousands of people in the most hidden corners of Germany, who could not have thought of buying books due to the expensive prices, have put together, little by little, a small library of reprints," the historian Heinrich Bensen wrote enthusiastically at the time.

The result of all this hubbub, argues Hoffner, was dramatically accelerated economic growth and industrial expansion that allowed Germany to quickly catch up with England, the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution.

(More here.)

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