How to Profit from a Plague Much of the pain that developing countries suffer under the global free-trade regime actually has nothing to do with free trade at all. One of the WTO’s agreements, the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (or TRIPS), focuses on copyright and patent rules. One might think that trade would be enhanced by lowering patent standards: making it easier for countries to share technology is surely a good way to spur technological development and make trade more efficient. It would increase productivity, innovation and exchange. But TRIPS is designed to do
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