Overworked, Hurried, Patent Examiners May Be A Troll’s Best Friend

The harried state of the US Patent Office’s workforce, swimming in a glut of new patent filings, is eroding their quality of work and may be allowing the kinds of patents that let trolls thrive, a new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research has found. The workers are under pressure to make quick decisions to earn the “credits” they need to be promoted. Perhaps more unsettling, as patent examiners rise in the ranks they are given less time to examine applications. Each government pay grade was associated with a 10- to 15-percent decrease in the time allotted to each patent examiner, per patent, the researchers discovered.