A poor person already has to sell it. Patents cost a minimum of $5,000, usually not less than $20,000 and often not less than $50,000 all things accounted for. That's just filing - it can take upwards of 5 years to get approved or rejected. And then, it is STILL worth nothing because you have to sue to enforce infringement, at costs north of $100,000 more often than not.
I propose that the value of IP for tax purposes is owner assigned. If you have no money to pay the tax, just declare $1. The catch is, that would make you ineligible to recover much more than that in the case of infringement.
As far as poor people, it changes little to none. But it grounds patent valuation, which are now arbitrary.
There are a few fundamental flaws with your proposal, but namely the inventor of a patent or holder of IP generally does not just randomly assign a value to their IP and win that amount in the instance of infringement. It's sort of the whole point of proving damages, because it would be impossible to calculate future damages for a violation of IP at the time the IP was created.
For example I invent and patent the widget and assign a $1B valuation to the invention. Apple violated my patent, manufactures the widget and sells $100M. Should I sue, my potential damages have nothing to do with the $1B valuation I made up but with the damages I suffered as a result of Apple violating my patent.
Alternatively I write a book and slap $1 valuation, because I assume there is no market for my writing or to avoid the big tax until I make it big. JK Rowling Violated my copyright and slaps her name on my book and sells millions of copies, again my damages have zero relation to the valuation I created for the IP.
Property taxes are a yearly thing. I did not explicitly state that, but my suggestion (which I have made numerous times both on HN and on Reddit) is that every year one can assign a different value, which addresses the majority of your complaint.
The other part, about damages, is a grey area today. It is up to the jury/judge to decide how much value to assign to the infringement, but they start from arbitrary statements - which is why Oracle can claim 9 lines are worth $5B even though they've been giving them away for free for a long time.
I propose that the value of IP for tax purposes is owner assigned. If you have no money to pay the tax, just declare $1. The catch is, that would make you ineligible to recover much more than that in the case of infringement.
As far as poor people, it changes little to none. But it grounds patent valuation, which are now arbitrary.