> First: if an inventor comes up with some idea but decides that instead of producing products based on their invention waits for other people to come up with the same idea and get money from them (or has someone do it by proxity), then is that actually something we want to encourage?

The idea is that the original inventor publishes the secret sauce via the required public disclosures and people either license the technology from him, he sues people who copy the technology without licensing, or he just cashes out and sells his whole interest to some other entity that does any of the above.

If someone else independently comes up with the same idea within a relatively short time frame, well in that case I don't think the patent should be granted. I think the legally sensible thing to do is to move patents in the direction of being an unfair competition type claim (unfair because you simply copy someone else's technology instead of developing your own).