But the TPP also aims to strengthen patents for pharmaceutical, financial and information technology companies, extend copyrights for entertainment studios, and safeguard the free flow of data across borders for Internet and software firms. It is in those areas, independent economists have said, that the TPP could have the biggest impact in the United States....

“If we are going to capture the future, then we’ve got to open up markets to the kinds of things that we’re really good at, that can’t be duplicated overseas,” Obama said at the Fairfax Chamber of Commerce in April. “We’re good at innovation. Were good at services. We can create things that other countries can’t create.”

Over the past decade, high-tech industries and those that rely heavily on intellectual property have dramatically outperformed traditional manufacturing, Labor Department statistics show. From 2002 to 2012, the combined economic output of Hollywood and “high-tech” industries – including pharmaceutical production, engineering services, and computer and aerospace manufacturing – grew by 30 percent, after adjusting for inflation. Traditional manufacturing shrank by 1.1 percent.