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That is literally what patents were invented for. Give the entity that puts the resources into creating something new some protection to be able to recoup that

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That does not answer the question of how the affordable versions would exist if the money to create them was not there in the first place. You cannot recoup what never existed.

Also, not all patents are monetizable.

I don't understand your point then. The original product exists because someone used their own or their investors money and made a bet on an idea.

Then they hope they can sell it at a profit.

Products becoming cheaper is a result of the processes getting more optimized ( on the production side and the supply side ) which is a function of the desire to increase the profit on a product.

Without any other player in the market this means the profit a company makes on that product increases over time.

With other players in that market that underprice your product it means that you have to reinvest parts of your profit into making the product cheaper ( or better ) for the consumer.

Is the idea that the person with $1M in 1900 had the ability to direct that towards their idea for air conditioning , whereas if the same amount of money disbursed among 100,000 people, they would just moderately increase their consumption and we would end up right where we started?

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