How a Federal Hiring Freeze Could Undermine the U.S. Patent SystemJanuary 27, 2025

Our U.S. Constitution, Article I Section 8, Clause 8, gives Congress the power to “promote the progress of science and the useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.”  This is known as the Patent Clause of the Constitution. 

The executive order to freeze all federal employee hiring has an unintended consequence of harming inventors, patent, applicants, and innovation investors.  The U.S. Patent Office has a well-known backlog of pending applications.  Currently, the backlog is over 825,000 unexamined applications.  In 2023, the most recent statistics available, more than 400,000 applications were filed in the U.S., and the average pendency is 25 months from filing to disposition, but often longer. 

In an effort to reduce the backlog, the Patent Office hired more than 600 new examiners in 2023, and hired another 850 examiners in 2024, with plans to continue hiring more examiners in 2025.  Generally, a pre-requisite to being hired as an examiner is a bachelor’s degree in engineering or science, or other STEM disciplines, such as chemistry and pharmacy.  Once hired, an examiner has a 4-month residency at the Patent Office Training Academy.  New examiners are also supervised by more experienced examiners.  In short, it takes time for a new examiner to get up to speed to be able to begin examining patent applications.

The planned hiring freeze contradicts the efforts of the Patent Office to examine applications in a more timely manner.  Delay in examination delays issuance of patents.  Patent applicants have no protection for an invention until the patent is granted.  Some inventors and patent applicants rely on the patent system to attract investors, who may be hesitant with long delays in the Patent Office.  Without investors or other financial resources, introductions of new innovations into the marketplace may be delayed. 

The U.S. patent system is intended to encourage innovation and intended to benefit everyone by disclosing technological improvements for use in the real world.   The patent system also provides the financial incentive to pursue research and development. A growing backlog of patent applications, and delayed examination, arises from a shortage of examiners.  Thus, freezing Patent Office hiring of examiners has a detrimental impact on the purpose of our patent system, that is, to promote the progress of science.

Kirk Hartung is a member of the Mechanical Patent Practice Group at McKee, Voorhees & Sease, PLC. For additional information please visit  www.ipmvs.com or contact Kirk directly via email at kirk.hartung@ipmvs.com.

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