阅读君进！第33篇有似原文！ - ChaseDream

There is widespread belief thatthe emergence of giant industries has been accompanied by an equivalent surgein industrial research. A recent study of important inventions madesince the turn of the century reveals that more than half were the product ofindividual inventors working alone, independent of organized industrialresearch. While industrial laboratories contributed such important products asnylon and transistors, independent inventors developed air conditioning, theautomatic transmission, the jet engine, the helicopter, insulin, andstreptomycin. Still other inventions, such as stainless steel, television,silicones, and Plexiglas (Plexiglas: n.树脂玻璃(多用以制造飞机座舱罩、镜片等)) were developed through the combined effortsof individuals and laboratory teams.

Despite these finding, we areurged to support monopolistic power on the grounds that such power creates anenvironment supportive of innovation. We are told that the independentinventor, along with the small firm, cannot afford to undertake the importantresearch needed to improve our standard of living while protecting ourdiminishing resources; that only the giant corporation or conglomerate, with itsprodigious assets, can afford the kind of expenditures that produce thetechnological advances vital to economic progress. But when we examineexpenditures for research, we find that of the more than $35 billion spent eachyear in this country, almost two-thirds is spent by the federal government.More than half of this government expenditure is funneled into militaryresearch and product development, accounting for the enormous increase inspending in such industries as nuclear energy, aircraft, missiles, andelectronics. There are those who consider it questionable that thesedefense-linked research projects will either improve our standard of living ordo much to protect our diminishing resources.

Recent history has demonstratedthat we may have to alter our longstanding conception of the process actuatedby competition. The price variable, once perceived as the dominant aspect ofthe process, is now subordinate to the competition of the new product, the newbusiness structure, and the new technology. While it can be assumed that in ahighly competitive industry not dominated by single corporation, investment ininnovation—a risky and expensive budget item—might meet resistance frommanagement and stockholders concerned about cost-cutting, efficient organization,and large advertising budgets, it would be an egregious error to equate themonopolistic producer with bountiful expenditures on research. Large-scaleenterprises tend to operate more comfortably in stable and securecircumstances, and their managerial bureaucracies tend to promote the statusquo and resist the threat implicit in change. Moreover, in some cases,industrial giants faced with little or no competition seek to avoid the capitalloss resulting from obsolescence by deliberately obstructing technologicalprogress. By contrast, small firms undeterred by large investments in plant andcapital equipment often aggressively pursue new techniques and new products,investing in innovation in order to expand their market shares.