ABSTRACT
Intellectual property is a natural field for economic analysis of law, and copyright is an important form of intellectual property. Yet while there are good introductions to the economics of copyright law, and a number of excellent articles on the economics of copying (as distinct from copyright law), no article examines the field of copyright as a whole, discussing the evolution and major doctrines in the law from an economic standpoint. This article, which is in the spirit of our recent articles on the economics of trademark law, tries to fill this gap – although the field is so vast that our analysis cannot be exhaustive. As in most of our work, we are particularly interested in positive analysis, and specifically in the question to what extent copyright law can be explained as a means for promoting efficient allocation of resources.
