As a blanket note about your next few points, I agree that the WC would disincentivize innovation to some extent. It was not my intention to claim—nor do I think I actually claimed (IIRC)—that it would have no socially undesirable incentive effects on innovation. Rather, the points I was making were more aimed at illuminating possible reasons why this might not be so bad. In general, my position is that the other upsides probably outweigh the (real!) downsides of disincentivizing innovation. Perhaps I should have been more clear about that.
But corporations are much less motivated by fame and love of their work than individuals, so this does not seem very relevant, and furthermore it does not address the inter-temporal issue which is the main objection to corporation taxes.
As a blanket note about your next few points, I agree that the WC would disincentivize innovation to some extent. It was not my intention to claim—nor do I think I actually claimed (IIRC)—that it would have no socially undesirable incentive effects on innovation. Rather, the points I was making were more aimed at illuminating possible reasons why this might not be so bad. In general, my position is that the other upsides probably outweigh the (real!) downsides of disincentivizing innovation. Perhaps I should have been more clear about that.
Yep, that seems right.