Copyright and Economic Incentives: An Application to Performers’ Rights in the Music Industry
运用委托代理模型分析版权法中的版税制度如何作为基于风险分担的激励结构，并以英国音乐产业为例，评估欧盟版权协调对表演者财务激励的影响。
of the economic effects of changes to the law and to see how markets respond to them.It does not seem that this approach has so far even been considered in European policy-making on copyright.Copyright is a relatively neglected area as far as economists are concerned and it occupies a backseat by comparison to the economic analysis of patents and R&D.This is surprising since it plays a major role in industries that are increasingly important in post-industrial economies, the cultural industries (publishing, sound recording, film, broadcasting) and computer software.It is a fruitful area for the application of law and economics, for modern theories of industrial organisation and for public choice theory.Copyright law provides the institutional framework for markets in the cultural sector of the economy.Each country has its own national copyright law; however, the necessity for that law to be effective with international trade of cultural products has led to harmonisation of copyright across countries.It has also led to a considerable edifice of co-operative arrangements for the administration of the use of copyright material and ofroyalty payments.While the law and its administration differ somewhat between countries, the general principles are similar.Here copyright issues in the UK music business are used as a case study for the detailed analysis of the economic role of copyright law, nevertheless, much of the content is relevant to the music business in other countries and to other cultural industries.In this paper, the economic analysis of copyright is extended from its existing concern with market failure to a principal-agent approach in which payment to authors by the royalty system is seen as an incentive structure based on risksharing.This approach enables us to investigate the role of copyright in bargaining between authors and publishers.It throws into question the view of a synergy of interests between author and publisher that is implied by giving Copyright protection to both parties, a point first raised implicitly by Plant ( 1934) but ignored by subsequent economists writing on the economics of copyright.At a time in which the future of copyright law is being considered in the light of technological upheaval, it is important to ask if it serves the public interest.This is an empirical question as well as a theoretical one.The paper first reviews the literature on the economics of copyright and outlines its role as an economic incentive.Different modes of payment for copyright are explained and analysed using the principal-agent model.The results are then applied to the changes in performers' rights in the UK due to the European Union harmonisation of copyright and their effect on financial incentives to performers is estimated for the music industry, using data from the UK, Sweden and Denmark.Some concluding remarks consider the policy implications.