> Is there any empirical evidence to the contrary? Do these studies show that the increased R&D spending, VC investments, etc., are there specifically due to pa

> Is there any empirical evidence to the contrary? Do these studies show that the increased R&D spending, VC investments, etc., are there specifically due to patent protection, and would otherwise not happen without? Many of these studies do attempt to support their conclusions as rigorously as possible. This is unfortunately not enough because of the lack of sufficient data or contextual information. But as an example, some studies take specific events in history, such as the introduction of patent laws (or strengthening thereof for a specific field) in a certain country, and compare various metrics (e.g. derived from industrial data) before and after these events. As you can imagine, it is almost impossible to show direct causation, but these studies do find strong correlations. Note that this is true for studies showing positive as well as negative effects of patent systems.