Does intellectual property protection deliver economic benefits? A multi-outcome meta-regression analysis of the evidence

Both theoretical and empirical work reports contingent and conflicting findings on how intellectual property (IP) protection affects related outcomes such as innovation, technology diffusion, productivity, or growth. To establish where the balance of the evidence lies, we conduct a multi-outcome meta-regression analysis to synthesize findings form 91 primary studies that report 1626 effect-size estimates for one or more outcomes. Controlling for unobserved heterogeneity and selection bias only, we find that the effect on innovation, technology diffusion, productivity, and economic growth is statistically or practically insignificant. The effect remains insignificant when we control for observed sources of heterogeneity and estimate meta-effects based on different scenarios for "best-practice" research. Our work contributes to the existing research effort by extending the application of the multi-outcome meta-regression analysis into evidence synthesis in economics. It also provides verifiable/replicable evidence indicating that the sanguine claims about the economic benefits of IP protection voiced in some legal studies and the advocacy literature are misleading.