Copyright\u27s Race, Gender and Age: A First Quantitative Look at Registrations

On a per capita basis, do African-American authors produce more copyright registrations than non-Hispanic whites? Do men and women show a within-group bias in choosing co-authors? And what decade in the average musician’s life is the most productive? This article provides answers to these questions – which happen to be yes, yes, and the 20s, respectively – and many more by statistically analyzing the 15 million entries that comprise the Copyright Office’s full record of registered works from 1978 through 2012. It provides a variety of perspectives on individuals’ creativity in modern-day America and on the beneficiaries of our copyright system along the axes of race, gender and age. Its findings suggest a need to promote greater diversity and equality in the processes of cultural production and the making of social meaning