[refurb]

By the way pharmaceutical companies also free ride on public universities.

Free ride? You think pharmaceutical companies just come along and pluck the best drugs for free? No, they out-license it from the university and pay royalties.

How else would Northwestern University build a brand new chemistry building from their Lyrica royalties?

[Daishiman]

Well, it's evidently cheaper for them to get it from a public resource than actually, you know, developing it from their own labs.

So nice for them to be able to pick and choose the successful research while not having to absorb all the other, less interesting research funded with public money.

[jessriedel]

I don't really get your complaint. The pipeline from basic research to sellable drug generally takes longer than the 20 year patent lifetime. So it's impossible for drug companies to get reimbursed for the entire drug development pipeline. Rather, at a crude level, the process is split in half: first do the basic research (funded by public money), then build on the basic research and demonstrate a viable drug (incentivized by patent-protected drug sales). The value-added by drug companies is substantial regardless of wether you think some other organization could do it better.

Complaining that drug companies are free-riding on public research is like complaining that the local 7-11 is free-riding on the public safety provided by police officers.