Intellectual property (IP) is one of the most important areas of study in international business. Your textbook discusses TRIPS and attempts to harmonize IP laws across countries. Nevertheless IP laws continue to be less than harmonized across countries. Please answer the following questions analytically. Why do we have IP laws in the first place, especially separate from property laws that already exist? Given the existence of these laws, what explains why for instance in the US we have a 17 year time period for patents, or 70 years after life for copyright, etc? In other words, where do these numbers come from? Finally, why do different countries differ in their IP laws? For example, most countries have different time periods for patents and copyrights, as well as different systems (first-to-file versus first-to-invent) for determining IP ownership. While answering the last part of this question, please consider cultural, economic, social, political, religious and other factors that might explain IP differences.