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The author of this article warns that stronger laws are needed to protect new kinds of home security systems from being copied and sold by imitators in order to prevent an eventual loss of manufacturing jobs within the industry. This conclusion is based on the following chain of reasoning: With the protection of stronger laws, manufacturers will naturallyinvest in the development of new home security products and production technologies, whereas without such protection, manufacturers will cut back on investment. If manufacturers cut back on investment, then a decline in product quality and marketability, as well as in production efficiency, will result. This, in turn, will cause the predicted loss of industry jobs. This line of reasoning is unconvincing for several reasons. To begin with, the author assumes that existing copyright, patent and trade secret laws are inadequate to protect home security system design. But the author never explains why these laws dont offer sufficient protection, nor does he offer any evidence to show that this is the case. Secondly, the argument depends on the twin assumptions that stronger legal protection will encourage manufacturers to invest in home security-system production, while the absence of strong legal protection will have the opposite effect. The author fails to provide any evidence or reasons for accepting these assumptions about cause-and-effect connections between the law and what happens in the marketplace. | 
