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Four Reasons to Reject Neo-Brandeisian Critiques of the Consumer Welfare Approach to Antitrust

Alden Abbott —  30 March 2021 — Leave a comment

In the battle of ideas, it is quite useful to be able to brandish clear and concise debating points in support of a proposition, backed by solid analysis. Toward that end, in a recent primer about antitrust law published by the Mercatus Center, I advance four reasons to reject neo-Brandeisian critiques of the consensus (at least, until very recently) consumer welfare-centric approach to antitrust enforcement. My four points, drawn from the primer (with citations deleted and hyperlinks added) are as follows:

First, the underlying assumptions of rising concentration and declining competition on which the neo-Brandeisian critique is largely based (and which are reflected in the introductory legislative findings of the Competition and Antitrust Law Enforcement Reform Act [of 2021, introduced by Senator Klobuchar on February 4, lack merit]. Chapter 6 of the 2020 Economic Report of the President, dealing with competition policy, summarizes research debunking those assumptions. To begin with, it shows that studies complaining that competition is in decline are fatally flawed. Studies such as one in 2016 by the Council of Economic Advisers rely on overbroad market definitions that say nothing about competition in specific markets, let alone across the entire economy. Indeed, in 2018, professor Carl Shapiro, chief DOJ antitrust economist in the Obama administration, admitted that a key summary chart in the 2016 study “is not informative regarding overall trends in concentration in well-defined relevant markets that are used by antitrust economists to assess market power, much less trends in concentration in the U.S. economy.” Furthermore, as the 2020 report points out, other literature claiming that competition is in decline rests on a problematic assumption that increases in concentration (even assuming such increases exist) beget softer competition. Problems with this assumption have been understood since at least the 1970s. The most fundamental problem is that there are alternative explanations (such as exploitation of scale economies) for why a market might demonstrate both high concentration and high markups—explanations that are still consistent with procompetitive behavior by firms. (In a related vein, research by other prominent economists has exposed flaws in studies that purport to show a weakening of merger enforcement standards in recent years.) Finally, the 2020 report notes that the real solution to perceived economic problems may be less government, not more: “As historic regulatory reform across American industries has shown, cutting government-imposed barriers to innovation leads to increased competition, strong economic growth, and a revitalized private sector.”

Second, quite apart from the flawed premises that inform the neo-Brandeisian critique, specific neo-Brandeisian reforms appear highly problematic on economic grounds. Breakups of dominant firms or near prohibitions on dominant firm acquisitions would sacrifice major economies of scale and potential efficiencies of integration, harming consumers without offering any proof that the new market structures in reshaped industries would yield consumer or producer benefits. Furthermore, a requirement that merging parties prove a negative (that the merger will not harm competition) would limit the ability of entrepreneurs and market makers to act on information about misused or underutilized assets through the merger process. This limitation would reduce economic efficiency. After-the-fact studies indicating that a large percentage of mergers do not add wealth and do not otherwise succeed as much as projected miss this point entirely. They ignore what the world would be like if mergers were much more difficult to enter into: a world where there would be lower efficiency and dynamic economic growth because there would be less incentive to seek out market-improving opportunities.

Third, one aspect of the neo-Brandeisian approach to antitrust policy is at odds with fundamental notions of fair notice of wrongdoing and equal treatment under neutral principles, notions that are central to the rule of law. In particular, the neo-Brandeisian call for considering a multiplicity of new factors such as fairness, labor, and the environment when enforcing policy is troublesome. There is no neutral principle for assigning weights to such divergent interests, and (even if weights could be assigned) there are no economic tools for accurately measuring how a transaction under review would affect those interests. It follows that abandoning antitrust law’s consumer-welfare standard in favor of an ill-defined multifactor approach would spawn confusion in the private sector and promote arbitrariness in enforcement decisions, undermining the transparency that is a key aspect of the rule of law. Whereas concerns other than consumer welfare may of course be validly considered in setting public policy, they are best dealt with under other statutory schemes, not under antitrust law.

Fourth, and finally, neo-Brandeisian antitrust proposals are not a solution to widely expressed concerns that big companies in general, and large digital platforms in particular, are undermining free speech by censoring content of which they disapprove. Antitrust law is designed to prevent businesses from creating impediments to market competition that reduce economic welfare; it is not well-suited to policing companies’ determinations regarding speech. To the extent that policymakers wish to address speech censorship on large platforms, they should consider other regulatory institutions that would be better suited to the task (such as communications law), while keeping in mind First Amendment limitations on the ability of government to control private speech.

In light of these four points, the primer concludes that the neo-Brandeisian-inspired antitrust “reform” proposals being considered by Congress should be rejected:

[E]fforts to totally reshape antitrust policy into a quasi-regulatory system that arbitrarily blocks and disincentivizes (1) welfare-enhancing mergers and (2) an array of actions by dominant firms are highly troubling. Such interventionist proposals ignore the lack of evidence of serious competitive problems in the American economy and appear arbitrary compared to the existing consumer-welfare-centric antitrust enforcement regime. To use a metaphor, Congress and public officials should avoid a drastic new antitrust cure for an anticompetitive disease that can be handled effectively with existing antitrust medications.

Let us hope that the serious harm associated with neo-Brandeisian legislative “deformation” (a more apt term than reformation) of the antitrust laws is given a full legislative airing before Congress acts.

In antitrust, economics, monopolization, truth on the market, vertical restraints , , , , , , ,
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Congress Should Not Legalize a News Media Cartel

Alden Abbott —  16 March 2021 — 1 Comment

Amazingly enough, at a time when legislative proposals for new antitrust restrictions are rapidly multiplying—see the Competition and Antitrust Law Enforcement Reform Act (CALERA), for example—Congress simultaneously is seriously considering granting antitrust immunity to a price-fixing cartel among members of the newsmedia. This would thereby authorize what the late Justice Antonin Scalia termed “the supreme evil of antitrust: collusion.” What accounts for this bizarre development?

Discussion

The antitrust exemption in question, embodied in the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act of 2021, was introduced March 10 simultaneously in the U.S. House and Senate. The press release announcing the bill’s introduction portrayed it as a “good government” effort to help struggling newspapers in their negotiations with large digital platforms, and thereby strengthen American democracy:

We must enable news organizations to negotiate on a level playing field with the big tech companies if we want to preserve a strong and independent press[.] …

A strong, diverse, free press is critical for any successful democracy. …

Nearly 90 percent of Americans now get news while on a smartphone, computer, or tablet, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted last year, dwarfing the number of Americans who get news via television, radio, or print media. Facebook and Google now account for the vast majority of online referrals to news sources, with the two companies also enjoying control of a majority of the online advertising market. This digital ad duopoly has directly contributed to layoffs and consolidation in the news industry, particularly for local news.

This legislation would address this imbalance by providing a safe harbor from antitrust laws so publishers can band together to negotiate with large platforms. It provides a 48-month window for companies to negotiate fair terms that would flow subscription and advertising dollars back to publishers, while protecting and preserving Americans’ right to access quality news. These negotiations would strictly benefit Americans and news publishers at-large; not just one or a few publishers.

The Journalism Competition and Preservation Act only allows coordination by news publishers if it (1) directly relates to the quality, accuracy, attribution or branding, and interoperability of news; (2) benefits the entire industry, rather than just a few publishers, and are non-discriminatory to other news publishers; and (3) is directly related to and reasonably necessary for these negotiations.

Lurking behind this public-spirited rhetoric, however, is the specter of special interest rent seeking by powerful media groups, as discussed in an insightful article by Thom Lambert. The newspaper industry is indeed struggling, but that is true overseas as well as in the United States. Competition from internet websites has greatly reduced revenues from classified and non-classified advertising. As Lambert notes, in “light of the challenges the internet has created for their advertising-focused funding model, newspapers have sought to employ the government’s coercive power to increase their revenues.”

In particular, media groups have successfully lobbied various foreign governments to impose rules requiring that Google and Facebook pay newspapers licensing fees to display content. The Australian government went even further by mandating that digital platforms share their advertising revenue with news publishers and give the publishers advance notice of any algorithm changes that could affect page rankings and displays. Media rent-seeking efforts took a different form in the United States, as Lambert explains (citations omitted):

In the United States, news publishers have sought to extract rents from digital platforms by lobbying for an exemption from the antitrust laws. Their efforts culminated in the introduction of the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act of 2018. According to a press release announcing the bill, it would allow “small publishers to band together to negotiate with dominant online platforms to improve the access to and the quality of news online.” In reality, the bill would create a four-year safe harbor for “any print or digital news organization” to jointly negotiate terms of trade with Google and Facebook. It would not apply merely to “small publishers” but would instead immunize collusive conduct by such major conglomerates as Murdoch’s News Corporation, the Walt Disney Corporation, the New York Times, Gannet Company, Bloomberg, Viacom, AT&T, and the Fox Corporation. The bill would permit news organizations to fix prices charged to digital platforms as long as negotiations with the platforms were not limited to price, were not discriminatory toward similarly situated news organizations, and somehow related to “the quality, accuracy, attribution or branding, and interoperability of news.” Given the ease of meeting that test—since news organizations could always claim that higher payments were necessary to ensure journalistic quality—the bill would enable news publishers in the United States to extract rents via collusion rather than via direct government coercion, as in Australia.

The 2021 version of the JCPA is nearly identical to the 2018 version discussed by Thom. The only substantive change is that the 2021 version strengthens the pro-cartel coalition by adding broadcasters (it applies to “any print, broadcast, or news organization”). While the JCPA plainly targets Facebook and Google (“online content distributors” with “not fewer than 1,000,000,000 monthly active users, in the aggregate, on its website”), Microsoft President Brad Smith noted in a March 12 House Antitrust Subcommittee Hearing on the bill that his company would also come under its collective-bargaining terms. Other online distributors could eventually become subject to the proposed law as well.

Purported justifications for the proposal were skillfully skewered by John Yun in a 2019 article on the substantively identical 2018 JCPA. Yun makes several salient points. First, the bill clearly shields price fixing. Second, the claim that all news organizations (in particular, small newspapers) would receive the same benefit from the bill rings hollow. The bill’s requirement that negotiations be “nondiscriminatory as to similarly situated news content creators” (emphasis added) would allow the cartel to negotiate different terms of trade for different “tiers” of organizations. Thus The New York Times and The Washington Post, say, might be part of a top tier getting the most favorable terms of trade. Third, the evidence does not support the assertion that Facebook and Google are monopolistic gateways for news outlets.

Yun concludes by summarizing the case against this legislation (citations omitted):

Put simply, the impact of the bill is to legalize a media cartel. The bill expressly allows the cartel to fix the price and set the terms of trade for all market participants. The clear goal is to transfer surplus from online platforms to news organizations, which will likely result in higher content costs for these platforms, as well as provisions that will stifle the ability to innovate. In turn, this could negatively impact quality for the users of these platforms.

Furthermore, a stated goal of the bill is to promote “quality” news and to “highlight trusted brands.” These are usually antitrust code words for favoring one group, e.g., those that are part of the News Media Alliance, while foreclosing others who are not “similarly situated.” What about the non-discrimination clause? Will it protect non-members from foreclosure? Again, a careful reading of the bill raises serious questions as to whether it will actually offer protection. The bill only ensures that the terms of the negotiations are available to all “similarly situated” news organizations. It is very easy to carve out provisions that would favor top tier members of the media cartel.

Additionally, an unintended consequence of antitrust exemptions can be that it makes the beneficiaries lax by insulating them from market competition and, ultimately, can harm the industry by delaying inevitable and difficult, but necessary, choices. There is evidence that this is what occurred with the Newspaper Preservation Act of 1970, which provided antitrust exemption to geographically proximate newspapers for joint operations.

There are very good reasons why antitrust jurisprudence reserves per se condemnation to the most egregious anticompetitive acts including the formation of cartels. Legislative attempts to circumvent the federal antitrust laws should be reserved solely for the most compelling justifications. There is little evidence that this level of justification has been met in this present circumstance.

Conclusion

Statutory exemptions to the antitrust laws have long been disfavored, and with good reason. As I explained in my 2005 testimony before the Antitrust Modernization Commission, such exemptions tend to foster welfare-reducing output restrictions. Also, empirical research suggests that industries sheltered from competition perform less well than those subject to competitive forces. In short, both economic theory and real-world data support a standard that requires proponents of an exemption to bear the burden of demonstrating that the exemption will benefit consumers.

This conclusion applies most strongly when an exemption would specifically authorize hard-core price fixing, as in the case with the JCPA. What’s more, the bill’s proponents have not borne the burden of justifying their pro-cartel proposal in economic welfare terms—quite the opposite. Lambert’s analysis exposes this legislation as the product of special interest rent seeking that has nothing to do with consumer welfare. And Yun’s evaluation of the bill clarifies that, not only would the JCPA foster harmful collusive pricing, but it would also harm its beneficiaries by allowing them to avoid taking steps to modernize and render themselves more efficient competitors.

In sum, though the JCPA claims to fly a “public interest” flag, it is just another private interest bill promoted by well-organized rent seekers would harm consumer welfare and undermine innovation.

In advertising, anticompetitive market distortions, antitrust, cartels, google, international, internet, journalism, markets, truth on the market , , , , , , , ,
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Guiding a Post-Brexit UK Trade Liberalization Strategy

Alden Abbott —  5 March 2021

In the wake of its departure from the European Union, the United Kingdom will have the opportunity to enter into new free trade agreements (FTAs) with its international trading partners that lower existing tariff and non-tariff barriers. Achieving major welfare-enhancing reductions in trade restrictions will not be easy. Trade negotiations pose significant political sensitivities, such as those arising from the high levels of protection historically granted certain industry sectors, particularly agriculture.

Nevertheless, the political economy of protectionism suggests that, given deepening globalization and the sudden change in U.K. trade relations wrought by Brexit, the outlook for substantial liberalization of U.K. trade has become much brighter. Below, I address some of the key challenges facing U.K. trade negotiators as they seek welfare-enhancing improvements in trade relations and offer a proposal to deal with novel trade distortions in the least protectionist manner.

Two New Challenges Affecting Trade Liberalization

In addition to traditional trade issues, such as tariff levels and industry sector-specific details, U.K, trade negotiators—indeed, trade negotiators from all nations—will have to confront two relatively new and major challenges that are creating several frictions.

First, behind-the-border anticompetitive market distortions (ACMDs) have largely replaced tariffs as the preferred means of protection in many areas. As I explained in a previous post on this site (citing an article by trade-law scholar Shanker Singham and me), existing trade and competition law have not been designed to address the ACMD problem:

[I]nternational trade agreements simply do not reach a variety of anticompetitive welfare-reducing government measures that create de facto trade barriers by favoring domestic interests over foreign competitors. Moreover, many of these restraints are not in place to discriminate against foreign entities, but rather exist to promote certain favored firms. We dub these restrictions “anticompetitive market distortions” or “ACMDs,” in that they involve government actions that empower certain private interests to obtain or retain artificial competitive advantages over their rivals, be they foreign or domestic. ACMDs are often a manifestation of cronyism, by which politically-connected enterprises successfully pressure government to shield them from effective competition, to the detriment of overall economic growth and welfare. …

As we emphasize in our article, existing international trade rules have been able to reach ACMDs, which include: (1) governmental restraints that distort markets and lessen competition; and (2) anticompetitive private arrangements that are backed by government actions, have substantial effects on trade outside the jurisdiction that imposes the restrictions, and are not readily susceptible to domestic competition law challenge. Among the most pernicious ACMDs are those that artificially alter the cost-base as between competing firms. Such cost changes will have large and immediate effects on market shares, and therefore on international trade flows.

Second, in recent years, the trade remit has expanded to include “nontraditional” issues such as labor, the environment, and now climate change. These concerns have generated support for novel tariffs that could help promote protectionism and harmful trade distortions. As explained in a recent article by the Special Trade Commission advisory group (former senior trade and antitrust officials who have provided independent policy advice to the U.K. government):

[The rise of nontraditional trade issues] has renewed calls for border tax adjustments or dual tariffs on an ex-ante basis. This is in sharp tension with the W[orld Trade Organization’s] long-standing principle of technological neutrality, and focus on outcomes as opposed to discriminating on the basis of the manner of production of the product. The problem is that it is too easy to hide protectionist impulses into concerns about the manner of production, and once a different tariff applies, it will be very difficult to remove. The result will be to significantly damage the liberalisation process itself leading to severe harm to the global economy at a critical time as we recover from Covid-19. The potentially damaging effects of ex ante tariffs will be visited most significantly in developing countries.

Dealing with New Trade Challenges in the Least Protectionist Manner

A broad approach to U.K. trade liberalization that also addresses the two new trade challenges is advanced in a March 2 report by the U.K. government’s Trade and Agricultural Commission (TAC, an independent advisory agency established in 2020). Although addressed primarily to agricultural trade, the TAC report enunciates principles applicable to U.K. trade policy in general, considering the impact of ACMDs and nontraditional issues. Key aspects of the TAC report are summarized in an article by Shanker Singham (the scholar who organized and convened the Special Trade Commission and who also served as a TAC commissioner):

The heart of the TAC report’s import policy contains an innovative proposal that attempts to simultaneously promote a trade liberalising agenda in agriculture, while at the same time protecting the UK’s high standards in food production and ensuring the UK fully complies with WTO rules on animal and plant health, as well as technical regulations that apply to food trade.

This proposal includes a mechanism to deal with some of the most difficult issues in agricultural trade which relate to animal welfare, environment and labour rules. The heart of this mechanism is the potential for the application of a tariff in cases where an aggrieved party can show that a trading partner is violating agreed standards in an FTA.

The result of the mechanism is a tariff based on the scale of the distortion which operates like a trade remedy. The mechanism can also be used offensively where a country is preventing market access by the UK as a result of the market distortion, or defensively where a distortion in a foreign market leads to excess exports from that market. …

[T]he tariff would be calibrated to the scale of the distortion and would apply only to the product category in which the distortion is occurring. The advantage of this over a more conventional trade remedy is that it is based on cost as opposed to price and is designed to remove the effects of the distorting activity. It would not be applied on a retaliatory basis in other unrelated sectors.

In exchange for this mechanism, the UK commits to trade liberalisation and, within a reasonable timeframe, zero tariffs and zero quotas. This in turn will make the UK’s advocacy of higher standards in international organisations much more credible, another core TAC proposal.

The TAC report also notes that behind the border barriers and anti-competitive market distortions (“ACMDs”) have the capacity to damage UK exports and therefore suggests a similar mechanism or set of disciplines could be used offensively. Certainly, where the ACMD is being used to protect a particular domestic industry, using the ACMD mechanism to apply a tariff for the exports of that industry would help, but this may not apply where the purpose is protective, and the industry does not export much.

I would argue that in this case, it would be important to ensure that UK FTAs include disciplines on these ACMDs which if breached could lead to dispute settlement and the potential for retaliatory tariffs for sectors in the UK’s FTA partner that do export. This is certainly normal WTO-sanctioned practice, and could be used here to encourage compliance. It is clear from the experience in dealing with countries that engage in ACMDs for trade or competition advantage that unless there are robust disciplines, mere hortatory language would accomplish little or nothing.

But this sort of mechanism with its concomitant commitment to freer trade has much wider potential application than just UK agricultural trade policy. It could also be used to solve a number of long standing trade disputes such as the US-China dispute, and indeed the most vexed questions in trade involving environment and climate change in ways that do not undermine the international trading system itself.

This is because the mechanism is based on an ex post tariff as opposed to an ex ante one which contains within it the potential for protectionism, and is prone to abuse. Because the tariff is actually calibrated to the cost advantage which is secured as a result of the violation of agreed international standards, it is much more likely that it will be simply limited to removing this cost advantage as opposed to becoming a punitive measure that curbs ordinary trade flows.

It is precisely this type of problem solving and innovative thinking that the international trading system needs as it faces a range of challenges that threaten liberalisation itself and the hard-won gains of the post war GATT/WTO system itself. The TAC report represents UK leadership that has been sought after since the decision to leave the EU. It has much to commend it.

Assessment and Conclusion

Even when administered by committed free traders, real-world trade liberalization is an exercise in welfare optimization, subject to constraints imposed by the actions of organized interest groups expressed through the political process. The rise of new coalitions (such as organizations committed to specified environmental goals, including limiting global warming) and the proliferation of ADMCs further complicates the trade negotiation calculus.

Fortunately, recognizing the “reform moment” created by Brexit, free trade-oriented experts (in particular, the TAC, supported by the Special Trade Commission) have recommended that the United Kingdom pursue a bold move toward zero tariffs and quotas. Narrow exceptions to this policy would involve after-the-fact tariffications to offset (1) the distortive effects of ACMDs and (2) derogation from rules embodying nontraditional concerns, such as environmental commitments. Such tariffications would be limited and cost-based, and, as such, welfare-superior to ex ante tariffs calibrated to price.

While the details need to be worked out, the general outlines of this approach represent a thoughtful and commendable market-oriented effort to secure substantial U.K. trade liberalization, subject to unavoidable constraints. More generally, one would hope that other jurisdictions (including the United States) take favorable note of this development as they generate their own trade negotiation policies. Stay tuned.

In agriculture, anticompetitive market distortions, brexit, european commission, international, international trade, truth on the market , , , , , , , ,
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The NCAA: Dr Jekyll or Mr Hyde?

Alden Abbott —  9 February 2021

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear a challenge next month to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ 2020 decision in NCAA v. Alston. Alston affirmed a district court decision that enjoined the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) from enforcing rules that restrict the education-related benefits its member institutions may offer students who play Football Bowl Subdivision football and Division I basketball.

This will be the first Supreme Court review of NCAA practices since NCAA v. Board of Regents in 1984, which applied the antitrust rule of reason in striking down the NCAA’s “artificial limit” on the quantity of televised college football games, but also recognized that “this case involves an industry in which horizontal restraints on competition are essential if the product [intercollegiate athletic contests] is to be available at all.” Significantly, in commenting on the nature of appropriate, competition-enhancing NCAA restrictions, the court in Board of Regents stated that:

[I]n order to preserve the character and quality of the [NCAA] ‘product,’ athletes must not be paid, must be required to attend class, and the like. And the integrity of the ‘product’ cannot be preserved except by mutual agreement; if an institution adopted such restrictions unilaterally, its effectiveness as a competitor on the playing field might soon be destroyed. Thus, the NCAA plays a vital role in enabling college football to preserve its character, and as a result enables a product to be marketed which might otherwise be unavailable. In performing this role, its actions widen consumer choice – not only the choices available to sports fans but also those available to athletes – and hence can be viewed as procompetitive. [footnote citation omitted]

One’s view of the Alston case may be shaped by one’s priors regarding the true nature of the NCAA. Is the NCAA a benevolent Dr. Jekyll, which seeks to promote amateurism and fairness in college sports to the benefit of student athletes and the general public?  Or is its benevolent façade a charade?  Although perhaps a force for good in its early years, has the NCAA transformed itself into an evil Mr. Hyde, using restrictive rules to maintain welfare-inimical monopoly power as a seller cartel of athletic events and a monopsony employer cartel that suppresses athletes’ wages? I will return to this question—and its bearing on the appropriate resolution of this legal dispute—after addressing key contentions by both sides in Alston.

Summarizing the Arguments in NCAA v Alston

The Alston class-action case followed in the wake of the 9th Circuit’s decision in O’Bannon v. NCAA (2015). O’Bannon affirmed in large part a district court’s ruling that the NCAA illegally restrained trade, in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act, by preventing football and men’s basketball players from receiving compensation for the use of their names, images, and likenesses. It also affirmed the district court’s injunction insofar as it required the NCAA to implement the less restrictive alternative of permitting athletic scholarships for the full cost of attendance. (I commented approvingly on the 9th Circuit’s decision in a previous TOTM post.) 

Subsequent antitrust actions by student-athletes were consolidated in the district court. After a bench trial, the district court entered judgment for the student-athletes, concluding in part that NCAA limits on education-related benefits were unreasonable restraints of trade. It enjoined those limits but declined to hold that other NCAA limits on compensation unrelated to education likewise violated Section 1.

In May 2020, a 9th Circuit panel held that the district court properly applied the three-step Sherman Act Section 1 rule of reason analysis in determining that the enjoined rules were unlawful restraints of trade.

First, the panel concluded that the student-athletes carried their burden at step one by showing that the restraints produced significant anticompetitive effects within the relevant market for student-athletes’ labor.

At step two, the NCAA was required to come forward with evidence of the restraints’ procompetitive effects. The panel endorsed the district court’s conclusion that only some of the challenged NCAA rules served the procompetitive purpose of preserving amateurism and thus improving consumer choice by maintaining a distinction between college and professional sports. Those rules were limits on above-cost-of-attendance payments unrelated to education, the cost-of-attendance cap on athletic scholarships, and certain restrictions on cash academic or graduation awards and incentives. The panel affirmed the district court’s conclusion that the remaining rules—restricting non-cash education-related benefits—did nothing to foster or preserve consumer demand. The panel held that the record amply supported the findings of the district court, which relied on demand analysis, survey evidence, and NCAA testimony.

The panel also affirmed the district court’s conclusion that, at step three, the student-athletes showed that any legitimate objectives could be achieved in a substantially less restrictive manner. The district court identified a less restrictive alternative of prohibiting the NCAA from capping certain education-related benefits and limiting academic or graduation awards or incentives below the maximum amount that an individual athlete may receive in athletic participation awards, while permitting individual conferences to set limits on education-related benefits. The panel held that the district court did not clearly err in determining that this alternative would be virtually as effective in serving the procompetitive purposes of the NCAA’s current rules and could be implemented without significantly increased cost.

Finally, the panel held that the district court’s injunction was not impermissibly vague and did not usurp the NCAA’s role as the superintendent of college sports. The panel also declined to broaden the injunction to include all NCAA compensation limits, including those on payments untethered to education. The panel concluded that the district court struck the right balance in crafting a remedy that both prevented anticompetitive harm to student-athletes while serving the procompetitive purpose of preserving the popularity of college sports.

The NCAA appealed to the Supreme Court, which granted the NCAA’s petition for certiorari Dec. 16, 2020. The NCAA contends that under Board of Regents, the NCAA rules regarding student-athlete compensation are reasonably related to preserving amateurism in college sports, are procompetitive, and should have been upheld after a short deferential review, rather than the full three-step rule of reason. According to the NCAA’s petition for certiorari, even under the detailed rule of reason, the 9th Circuit’s decision was defective. Specifically:

The Ninth Circuit … relieved plaintiffs of their burden to prove that the challenged rules unreasonably restrain trade, instead placing a “heavy burden” on the NCAA … to prove that each category of its rules is procompetitive and that an alternative compensation regime created by the district court could not preserve the procompetitive distinction between college and professional sports. That alternative regime—under which the NCAA must permit student-athletes to receive unlimited “education-related benefits,” including post-eligibility internships that pay unlimited amounts in cash and can be used for recruiting or retention—will vitiate the distinction between college and professional sports. And via the permanent injunction the Ninth Circuit upheld, the alternative regime will also effectively make a single judge in California the superintendent of a significant component of college sports. The Ninth Circuit’s approval of this judicial micromanagement of the NCAA denies the NCAA the latitude this Court has said it needs, and endorses unduly stringent scrutiny of agreements that define the central features of sports leagues’ and other joint ventures’ products. The decision thus twists the rule of reason into a tool to punish (and thereby deter) procompetitive activity.

Two amicus briefs support the NCAA’s position. One, filed on behalf of “antitrust law and business school professors,” stresses that the 9th Circuit’s decision misapplied the third step of the rule of reason by requiring defendants to show that their conduct was the least restrictive means available (instead of requiring plaintiff to prove the existence of an equally effective but less restrictive rule). More broadly:

[This approach] permits antitrust plaintiffs to commandeer the judiciary and use it to regulate and modify routine business conduct, so long as that conduct is not the least restrictive conduct imaginable by a plaintiff’s attorney or district judge. In turn, the risk that procompetitive ventures may be deemed unlawful and subject to treble damages liability simply because they could have operated in a marginally less restrictive manner is likely to chill beneficial business conduct.

A second brief, filed on behalf of “antitrust economists,” emphasizes that the NCAA has adapted the rules governing design of its product (college amateur sports) over time to meet consumer demand and to prevent colleges from pursuing their own interests (such as “pay to  play”) in ways that would conflict with the overall procompetitive aims of the collaboration. While acknowledging that antitrust courts are free to scrutinize collaborations’ rules that go beyond the design of the product itself (such as the NCAA’s broadcast restrictions), the brief cites key Supreme Court decisions (NCAA v. Board of Regents and Texaco Inc. v. Dagher), for the proposition that courts should stay out of restrictions on the core activity of the joint venture itself. It then summarizes the policy justification for such judicial non-interference:

Permitting judges and juries to apply the Sherman Act to such decisions [regarding core joint venture activity] will inevitably create uncertainty that undermines innovation and investment incentives across any number of industries and collaborative ventures. In these circumstances, antitrust courts would be making public policy regarding the desirability of a product with particular features, as opposed to ferreting out agreements or unilateral conduct that restricts output, raises prices, or reduces innovation to the detriment of consumers.

In their brief opposing certiorari, counsel for Alston take the position that, in reality, the NCAA is seeking a special antitrust exemption for its competitively restrictive conduct—an issue that should be determined by Congress, not courts. Their brief notes that the concept of “amateurism” has changed over the years and that some increases in athletes’ compensation have been allowed over time. Thus, in the context of big-time college football and basketball:

[A]mateurism is little more than a pretext. It is certainly not a Sherman Act concept, much less a get-out-of-jail-free card that insulates any particular set of NCAA restraints from scrutiny.

Who Has the Better Case?

The NCAA’s position is a strong one. Association rules touching on compensation for college athletes are part of the core nature of the NCAA’s “amateur sports” product, as the Supreme Court stated (albeit in dictum) in Board of Regents. Furthermore, subsequent Supreme Court jurisprudence (see 2010’s American Needle Inc. v. NFL) has eschewed second-guessing of joint-venture product design decisions—which, in the case of the NCAA, involve formulating the restrictions (such as whether and how to compensate athletes) that are deemed key to defining amateurism.

The Alston amicus curiae briefs ably set forth the strong policy considerations that support this approach, centered on preserving incentives for the development of efficient welfare-generating joint ventures. Requiring joint venturers to provide “least restrictive means” justifications for design decisions discourages innovative activity and generates costly uncertainty for joint-venture planners, to the detriment of producers and consumers (who benefit from joint-venture innovations) alike. Claims by defendant Alston that the NCAA is in effect seeking to obtain a judicial antitrust exemption miss the mark; rather, the NCAA merely appears to be arguing that antitrust should be limited to evaluating restrictions that fall outside the scope of the association’s core mission. Significantly, as discussed in the NCAA’s brief petitioning for certiorari, other federal courts of appeals decisions in the 3rd, 5th, and 7th Circuits have treated NCAA bylaws going to the definition of amateurism in college sports as presumptively procompetitive and not subject to close scrutiny. Thus, based on the arguments set forth by litigants, a Supreme Court victory for the NCAA in Alston would appear sound as a matter of law and economics.

There may, however, be a catch. Some popular commentary has portrayed the NCAA as a malign organization that benefits affluent universities (and their well-compensated coaches) while allowing member colleges to exploit athletes by denying them fair pay—in effect, an institutional Mr. Hyde.

What’s more, consistent with the Mr. Hyde story, a number of major free-market economists (including, among others, Nobel laureate Gary Becker) have portrayed the NCAA as an anticompetitive monopsony employer cartel that has suppressed the labor market demand for student athletes, thereby limiting their wages, fringe benefits, and employment opportunities. (In a similar vein, the NCAA is seen as a monopolist seller cartel in the market for athletic events.) Consistent with this perspective, promoting the public good of amateurism (the Dr. Jekyll story) is merely a pretextual façade (a cover story, if you will) for welfare-inimical naked cartel conduct. If one buys this alternative story, all core product restrictions adopted by the NCAA should be fair game for close antitrust scrutiny—and thus, the 9th Circuit’s decision in Alston merits affirmation as a matter of antitrust policy.

There is, however, a persuasive response to the cartel story, set forth in Richard McKenzie and Dwight Lee’s essay “The NCAA:  A Case Study of the Misuse of the Monopsony and Monopoly Models” (Chapter 8 of their 2008 book “In Defense of Monopoly:  How Market Power Fosters Creative Production”). McKenzie and Lee examine the evidence bearing on economists’ monopsony cartel assertions (and, in particular, the evidence presented in a 1992 study by Arthur Fleischer, Brian Goff, and Richard Tollison) and find it wanting:

Our analysis leads inexorably to the conclusion that the conventional economic wisdom regarding the intent and consequences of NCAA restrictions is hardly as solid, on conceptual grounds, as the NCAA critics assert, often without citing relevant court cases. We have argued that the conventional wisdom is wrong in suggesting that, as a general proposition,

• college athletes are materially “underpaid” and are “exploited”;

• cheating on NCAA rules is prima facie evidence of a cartel intending to restrict employment and suppress athletes’ wages;

• NCAA rules violate conventional antitrust doctrine;          

• barriers to entry ensure the continuance of the NCAA’s monopsony powers over athletes.

No such entry barriers (other than normal organizational costs, which need to be covered to meet any known efficiency test for new entrants) exist. In addition, the Supreme Court’s decision in NCAA indicates that the NCAA would be unable to prevent through the courts the emergence of competing athletic associations. The actual existence of other athletic associations indicates that entry would be not only possible but also practical if athletes’ wages were materially suppressed.

Conventional economic analysis of NCAA rules that we have challenged also is misleading in suggesting that collegiate sports would necessarily be improved if the NCAA were denied the authority to regulate the payment of athletes. Given the absence of legal barriers to entry into the athletic association market, it appears that if athletes’ wages were materially suppressed (or as grossly suppressed as the critics claim), alternative sports associations would form or expand, and the NCAA would be unable to maintain its presumed monopsony market position. The incentive for colleges and universities to break with the NCAA would be overwhelming.

From our interpretation of NCAA rules, it does not follow necessarily that athletes should not receive any more compensation than they do currently. Clearly, market conditions change, and NCAA rules often must be adjusted to accommodate those changes. In the absence of entry barriers, we can expect the NCAA to adjust, as it has adjusted, in a competitive manner its rules of play, recruitment, and retention of athletes. Our central point is that contrary to the proponents of the monopsony thesis, the collegiate athletic market is subject to the self-correcting mechanism of market pressures. We have reason to believe that the proposed extension of the antitrust enforcement to the NCAA rules or proposed changes in sports law explicitly or implicitly recommended by the proponents of the cartel thesis would be not only unnecessary but also counterproductive.

Although a closer examination of the McKenzie and Lee’s critique of the economists’ cartel story is beyond the scope of this comment, I find it compelling.

Conclusion

In sum, the claim that antitrust may properly be applied to combat the alleged “exploitation” of college athletes by NCAA compensation regulations does not stand up to scrutiny. The NCAA’s rules that define the scope of amateurism may be imperfect, but there is no reason to think that empowering federal judges to second guess and reformulate NCAA athletic compensation rules would yield a more socially beneficial (let alone optimal) outcome. (Believing that the federal judiciary can optimally reengineer core NCAA amateurism rules is a prime example of the Nirvana fallacy at work.)  Furthermore, a Supreme Court decision affirming the 9th Circuit could do broad mischief by undermining case law that has accorded joint venturers substantial latitude to design the core features of their collective enterprise without judicial second-guessing. It is to be hoped that the Supreme Court will do the right thing and strongly reaffirm the NCAA’s authority to design and reformulate its core athletic amateurism product as it sees fit.

In antitrust, barriers to entry, cartels, Education, exemptions, higher education, monopolization, NCAA, sports, truth on the market, universities , , , , , , ,
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Farewell

Alden Abbott —  29 March 2018

On Monday, April 2, I will leave the Heritage Foundation to enter federal government service.  Accordingly, today I am signing off as a regular contributor to Truth on the Market.  First and foremost, I owe a great debt of gratitude to Geoff Manne, who was kind enough to afford me access to TOTM.  Geoff’s outstanding leadership has made TOTM the leading blog site bringing to bear sound law and economics insights on antitrust and related regulatory topics.  I was also privileged to have the opportunity to work on an article with TOTM stalwart Thom Lambert, whose concise book How To Regulate is by far the best general resource on sound regulatory principles (it should sit on the desk of the head of every regulatory agency).  I have also greatly benefited from the always insightful analyses of fellow TOTM bloggers Allen Gibby, Eric Fruits, Joanna Shepherd, Kristian Stout, Mike Sykuta, and Neil Turkewitz.  Thanks to all!  I look forward to continuing to seek enlightenment at truthonthemarket.com.

In truth on the market
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The International Competition Network at Seventeen

Alden Abbott —  28 March 2018

Introduction

Last week I attended the 17th Annual Conference of the International Competition Network (ICN) held in New Delhi, India from March 21-23.  The Delhi Conference highlighted the key role of the ICN in promoting global convergence toward “best practices” in substantive and procedural antitrust analysis by national antitrust (“competition”) agencies.  The ICN operates as a virtual network of competition agencies and expert “non-governmental advisers” (NGAs), not governments.  As such, the ICN promulgates “recommended practices,” provides online training and other assistance to competition agencies, and serves as a forum for the building of relationships among competition officials (an activity which facilitates cooperation on particular matters and the exchange of advice on questions of antitrust policy and administration).  There is a general consensus among competition agencies and NGAs (I am one) that the ICN has accomplished a great deal since its launch in 2001 – indeed, it has far surpassed expectations.  Although (not surprisingly) inter-jurisdictional differences in perspective on particular competition issues remain, the ICN has done an excellent job in helping ensure that national competition agencies understand each other as they carry out their responsibilities.  By “speaking a common antitrust language,” informed by economic reasoning, agencies are better able to cooperate on individual matters and evaluate the merits of potential changes in law and procedure.

Pre-ICN Program Hosted by Competition Policy International (CPI)

Special one-day programs immediately preceding the ICN have proliferated in recent years.  On March 20, I participated in the small group one-day program hosted by Competition Policy International (CPI), attended by senior competition agency officials, private practitioners, and scholars.  This program featured a morning roundtable covering problems of extraterritoriality and an afternoon roundtable focused on competition law challenges in the digital economy.

The extraterritoriality session reflected the growing number of competition law matters (particularly cartels and mergers) that have effects in multiple jurisdictions.  There appeared to be general support for the proposition that a competition authority should impose remedies that have extraterritorial application only to the extent necessary to remedy harm to competition within the enforcing jurisdiction.  There also was a general consensus that it is very difficult for a competition authority to cede enforcement jurisdiction to a foreign authority, when the first authority finds domestic harm attributable to extraterritorial conduct and has the ability to assert jurisdiction.  Thus, although efforts to promote comity in antitrust enforcement are worthwhile, it must be recognized that there are practical limitations to such initiatives.  As such, a focus on enhancing coordination and cooperation among multiple agencies investigating the same conduct will be of paramount importance.

The digital economy roundtable directed particular attention to enforcement challenges raised by Internet “digital platforms” (e.g., Google, Facebook, Amazon).  In particular, with respect to digital platforms, roundtable participants discussed whether new business models and disruptive innovations create challenges to existing competition law and practices; what recent technology changes portend for market definition, assessment of market power, and other antitrust enforcement concepts; whether new analytic tools are required; and what are good mechanisms to harmonize regulation and competition enforcement.  Although there was no overall consensus on these topics, there was robust discussion of multi-sided market analysis and differences in approach to digital platform oversight.

An ICN Conference Overview

As in recent years, the ICN Conference itself featured set-piece (no Q&A) plenary sessions involving colloquies among top agency officials regarding cartels, unilateral conduct, mergers, advocacy, and agency effectiveness – the areas covered during the year by the ICN’s specialized working groups.  Numerous break-out sessions allowed ICN delegates to discuss in detail particular developments in these areas, and to evaluate and hash out the relative merits of competing approaches to problems.  At least seven generalizations can be drawn from the Delhi Conference’s deliberations.

First, other international organizations that initially had kept their distance from the ICN, specifically the OECD, the World Bank, and UNCTAD, now engage actively with the ICN.  This is a very positive development indeed.  Research carried out by the OECD on competition policy – for example, on the economic evaluation of regulatory approaches (important for competition advocacy), digital platforms, and public tenders – has been injected as “policy inputs” to discrete ICN initiatives.  Annual Competition advocacy contests cosponsored by the ICN and the World Bank have enabled a large number of agencies (particularly in developing countries) to showcase their successes in helping improve the competitive climate within their jurisdictions.  UNCTAD initiatives on competition and economic development can be effectively presented to new competition agencies through ICN involvement.

Second, competition authorities are focusing more intensively on “vertical mergers” involving firms at different levels of the distribution chain.  The ICN can help agencies be attentive to the need to weigh procompetitive efficiencies as well as new theories of anticompetitive harm in investigating these mergers.

Third, the transformation of economies worldwide through the Internet and the “digital revolution” is posing new challenges – and opportunities – for enforcers.  Policy analysis, informed by economics, is evolving in this area.

Fourth, cartels and bid rigging (collusion in public tenders was the showcase “special project” at the Delhi Conference) investigations remain as significant as ever.  Thinking on the administration of government leniency programs and “ex officio” investigations aimed at ferreting out cartels continues to be refined.

Fifth, the continuing growth in the number and scope of competition laws and the application of those laws to international commerce places a premium on enhanced coordination among competition agencies.  The ICN’s role in facilitating such cooperation thus assumes increased importance.

Sixth, issues of due process, or procedural fairness, commendably are generally recognized as important elements of effective agency administration.  Nevertheless, the precise contours of due process, and its specific application, are not uniform across agencies, and merit continued exploration by the ICN.

Seventh, the question of whether non-purely economic factors (such as fairness, corporate size, and the rights of workers) should be factored into competition analysis is gaining increased traction in a number of jurisdictions, and undoubtedly will be a subject of considerable debate in the years to come.

Conclusion

The ICN is by now a mature organization.  As a virtual network that relies on the power to persuade, not to dictate, it is dynamic, not static.  The ICN continues to respond flexibly to the changing needs of its many members and to global economic developments, within the context of the focused work carried out by its various substantive and process-related working groups.  The Delhi Conference provided a welcome opportunity for a timely review of its accomplishments and an assessment of its future direction.  In short, the ICN remains a highly useful vehicle for welfare-enhancing “soft convergence” among competition law regimes.

 

In antitrust, international competition network, truth on the market
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The Ninth Circuit’s Welcome Recognition of FTC Authority to Address Welfare-Inimical Broadband Abuses

Alden Abbott —  2 March 2018

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) well-recognized expertise in assessing unfair or deceptive acts or practices can play a vital role in policing abusive broadband practices.  Unfortunately, however, because Section 5(a)(2) of the FTC Act exempts common carriers from the FTC’s jurisdiction, serious questions have been raised about the FTC’s authority to deal with unfair or deceptive practices in cyberspace that are carried out by common carriers, but involve non-common-carrier activity (in contrast, common carrier services have highly regulated terms and must be made available to all potential customers).

Commendably, the Ninth Circuit held on February 26, in FTC v. AT&T Mobility, that harmful broadband data throttling practices by a common carrier were subject to the FTC’s unfair acts or practices jurisdiction, because the common carrier exception is “activity-based,” and the practices in question did not involve common carrier services.  Key excerpts from the summary of the Ninth Circuit’s opinion follow:

The en banc court affirmed the district court’s denial of AT&T Mobility’s motion to dismiss an action brought by th Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) under Section 5 of the FTC Act, alleging that AT&T’s data-throttling plan was unfair and deceptive. AT&T Mobility’s data-throttling is a practice by which the company reduced customers’ broadband data speed without regard to actual network congestion. Section 5 of the FTC Act gives the agency enforcement authority over “unfair or deceptive acts or practices,” but exempts “common carriers subject to the Acts to regulate commerce.” 15 U.S.C § 45(a)(1), (2). AT&T moved to dismiss the action, arguing that it was exempt from FTC regulation under Section 5. . . .

The en banc court held that the FTC Act’s common carrier exemption was activity-based, and therefore the phrase “common carriers subject to the Acts to regulate commerce” provided immunity from FTC regulation only to the extent that a common carrier was engaging in common carrier services. In reaching this conclusion, the en banc court looked to the FTC Act’s text, the meaning of “common carrier” according to the courts around the time the statute was passed in 1914, decades of judicial interpretation, the expertise of the FTC and Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”), and legislative history.

Addressing the FCC’s order, issued on March 12, 2015, reclassifying mobile data service from a non-common carriage service to a common carriage service, the en banc court held that the prospective reclassification order did not rob the FTC of its jurisdiction or authority over conduct occurring before the order. Accordingly, the en banc court affirmed the district court’s denial of AT&T’s motion to dismiss.

A key introductory paragraph in the Ninth Circuit’s opinion underscores the importance of the court’s holding for sound regulatory policy:

This statutory interpretation [that the common carrier exception is activity-based] also accords with common sense. The FTC is the leading federal consumer protection agency and, for many decades, has been the chief federal agency on privacy policy and enforcement. Permitting the FTC to oversee unfair and deceptive non-common-carriage practices of telecommunications companies has practical ramifications. New technologies have spawned new regulatory challenges. A phone company is no longer just a phone company. The transformation of information services and the ubiquity of digital technology mean that telecommunications operators have expanded into website operation, video distribution, news and entertainment production, interactive entertainment services and devices, home security and more. Reaffirming FTC jurisdiction over activities that fall outside of common-carrier services avoids regulatory gaps and provides consistency and predictability in regulatory enforcement.

But what can the FTC do about unfair or deceptive practices affecting broadband services, offered by common carriers, subsequent to the FCC’s 2015 reclassification of mobile data service as a common carriage service?  The FTC will be able to act, assuming that the Federal Communications Commission’s December 2017 rulemaking, reclassifying mobile broadband Internet access service as not involving a common carrier service, passes legal muster (as it should).  In order to avoid any legal uncertainty, however, Congress could take the simple step of eliminating the FTC Act’s common carrier exception – an outdated relic that threatens to generate disparate enforcement outcomes toward the same abusive broadband practice, based merely upon whether the parent company is deemed a “common carrier.”

In federal trade commission, truth on the market ,
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A Judicial Nod to Empirically-Based Regulation

Alden Abbott —  1 March 2018

The cause of basing regulation on evidence-based empirical science (rather than mere negative publicity) – and of preventing regulatory interference with First Amendment commercial speech rights – got a judicial boost on February 26.

Specifically, in National Association of Wheat Growers et al. v. Zeise (Monsanto Case), a California federal district court judge preliminarily enjoined application against Monsanto of a labeling requirement imposed by a California regulatory law, Proposition 65.  Proposition 65 mandates that the Governor of California publish a list of chemicals known to the State to cause cancer, and also prohibits any person in the course of doing business from knowingly and intentionally exposing anyone to the listed chemicals without a prior “clear and reasonable” warning.  In this case, California sought to make Monsanto place warning labels on its popular Roundup weed killer products, stating that glyphosate, a widely-used herbicide and key Roundup ingredient, was known to cause cancer.  Monsanto, joined by various agribusiness entities, sued to enjoin California from taking that action.  Judge William Shubb concluded that there was insufficient evidence that the active ingredient in Roundup causes cancer, and that requiring Roundup to publish warning labels would violate Monsanto’s First Amendment rights by compelling it to engage in false and misleading speech.  Salient excerpts from Judge Shubb’s opinion are set forth below:

[When, as here, it compels commercial speech, in order to satisfy the First Amendment,] [t]he State has the burden of demonstrating that a disclosure requirement is purely factual and uncontroversial, not unduly burdensome, and reasonably related to a substantial government interest. . . .  The dispute in the present case is over whether the compelled disclosure is of purely factual and uncontroversial information. In this context, “uncontroversial” “refers to the factual accuracy of the compelled disclosure, not to its subjective impact on the audience.” [citation omitted]

 On the evidence before the court, the required warning for glyphosate does not appear to be factually accurate and uncontroversial because it conveys the message that glyphosate’s carcinogenicity is an undisputed fact, when almost all other regulators have concluded that there is insufficient evidence that glyphosate causes cancer. . . .

It is inherently misleading for a warning to state that a chemical is known to the state of California to cause cancer based on the finding of one organization [, the International Agency for Research on Cancer] (which as noted above, only found that substance is probably carcinogenic), when apparently all other regulatory and governmental bodies have found the opposite, including the EPA, which is one of the bodies California law expressly relies on in determining whether a chemical causes cancer. . . .  [H]ere, given the heavy weight of evidence in the record that glyphosate is not in fact known to cause cancer, the required warning is factually inaccurate and controversial. . . .

The court’s First Amendment inquiry here boils down to what the state of California can compel businesses to say. Whether Proposition 65’s statutory and regulatory scheme is good policy is not at issue. However, where California seeks to compel businesses to provide cancer warnings, the warnings must be factually accurate and not misleading. As applied to glyphosate, the required warnings are false and misleading. . . .

As plaintiffs have shown that they are likely to succeed on the merits of their First Amendment claim, are likely to suffer irreparable harm absent an injunction, and that the balance of equities and public interest favor an injunction, the court will grant plaintiffs’ request to enjoin Proposition 65’s warning requirement for glyphosate.

The Monsanto Case commendably highlights a little-appreciated threat of government overregulatory zeal.  Not only may excessive regulation fail a cost-benefit test, and undermine private property rights, it may violates the First Amendment speech rights of private actors when it compels inaccurate speech.  The negative economic consequences may be substantial  when the government-mandated speech involves a claim about a technical topic that not only lacks empirical support (and thus may be characterized as “junk science”), but is deceptive and misleading (if not demonstrably false).  Deceptive and misleading speech in the commercial market place reduces marketplace efficiency and reduces social welfare (both consumer’s surplus and producer’s surplus).  In particular, it does this by deterring mutually beneficial transactions (for example, purchases of Roundup that would occur absent misleading labeling about cancer risks), generating suboptimal transactions (for example, purchases of inferior substitutes to Roundup due to misleading Roundup labeling), and distorting competition within the marketplace (the reallocation of market shares among Roundup and substitutes not subject to labeling).  The short-term static effects of such market distortions may be dwarfed by the  dynamic effects, such as firms’ disincentives to invest in innovation (or even participate) in markets subject to inaccurate information concerning the firms’ products or services.

In short, the Monsanto Case highlights the fact that government regulation not only imposes an implicit tax on business – it affirmatively distorts the workings of individual markets if it causes the introduction misleading or deceptive information that is material to marketplace decision-making.  The threat of such distortive regulation may be substantial, especially in areas where regulators interact with “public interest clients” that have an incentive to demonize disfavored activities by private commercial actors – one example being the health and safety regulation of agricultural chemicals.  In those areas, there may be a case for federal preemption of state regulation, and for particularly close supervision of federal agencies to avoid economically inappropriate commercial speech mandates.  Stay tuned for future discussion of such potential legal reforms.

In agtech/biotech, environmental regulation, Jurisdictional competition, regulation, regulatory reform, truth on the market
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Foreign Export Cartels, Comity, and the Separation of Powers

Alden Abbott —  15 February 2018

Over the last two decades, the United States government has taken the lead in convincing jurisdictions around the world to outlaw “hard core” cartel conduct.  Such cartel activity reduces economic welfare by artificially fixing prices and reducing the output of affected goods and services.  At the same, the United States has acted to promote international cooperation among government antitrust enforcers to detect, investigate, and punish cartels.

In 2017, however, the U.S. Court of Appeal for the Second Circuit (citing concerns of “international comity”) held that a Chinese export cartel that artificially raised the price of vitamin imports into the United States should be shielded from U.S. antitrust penalties—based merely on one brief from a Chinese government agency that said it approved of the conduct. The U.S. Supreme Court is set to review that decision later this year, in a case styled Animal Science Products, Inc., v. Hebei Welcome Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd.  By overturning the Second Circuit’s ruling (and disavowing the overly broad “comity doctrine” cited by that court), the Supreme Court would reaffirm the general duty of federal courts to apply federal law as written, consistent with the constitutional separation of powers.  It would also reaffirm the importance of the global fight against cartels, which has reflected consistent U.S. executive branch policy for decades (and has enjoyed strong support from the International Competition Network, the OECD, and the World Bank).

Finally, as a matter of economic policy, the Animal Science Products case highlights the very real harm that occurs when national governments tolerate export cartels that reduce economic welfare outside their jurisdictions, merely because domestic economic interests are not directly affected.  In order to address this problem, the U.S. government should negotiate agreements with other nations under which the signatory states would agree:  (1) not to legally defend domestic exporting entities that impose cartel harm in other jurisdictions; and (2) to cooperate more fully in rooting out harmful export-cartel activity, wherever it is found.

For a more fulsome discussion of the separation of powers, international relations, and economic policy issues raised by the Animal Science Products case, see my recent Heritage Foundation Legal Memorandum entitled The Supreme Court and Animal Science Products: Sovereignty and Export Cartels.

In antitrust, cartels, China, international, international competition, truth on the market ,
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Fourth Annual Heritage Foundation Antitrust Conference: A Quick Summary

Alden Abbott —  26 January 2018

On January 23rd, the Heritage Foundation convened its Fourth Annual Antitrust Conference, “Trump Antitrust Policy after One Year.”  The entire Conference can be viewed online (here).  The Conference featured a keynote speech, followed by three separate panels that addressed  developments at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), at the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division (DOJ), and in the international arena, developments that can have a serious effect on the country’s economic growth and expansion of our business and industrial sector.

  1. Professor Bill Kovacic’s Keynote Speech

The conference started with a bang, featuring a stellar keynote speech (complemented by excellent power point slides) by GW Professor and former FTC Chairman Bill Kovacic, who also serves as a Member of the Board of the UK Government’s Competitive Markets Authority.  Kovacic began by noting the claim by senior foreign officials that “nothing is happening” in U.S. antitrust enforcement.  Although this perception may be inaccurate, Kovacic argued that it colors foreign officials’ dealings with the U.S., and continues a preexisting trend of diminishing U.S. influence on foreign governments’ antitrust enforcement systems.  (It is widely believed that the European antitrust model is dominant internationally.)

In order to enhance the perceived effectiveness (and prestige) of American antitrust on the global plane, American antitrust enforcers should, according to Kovacic, adopt a positive agenda citing specific priorities for action (as opposed to a “negative approach” focused on what actions will not be taken) – an orientation which former FTC Chairman Muris employed successfully in the last Bush Administration.  The positive engagement themes should be communicated powerfully to the public here and abroad through active public engagement by agency officials.  Agency strengths, such as FTC market studies and economic expertise, should be highlighted.

In addition, the FTC and Justice Department should act more like an “antitrust policy joint venture” at home and abroad, extending cooperation beyond guidelines to economic research, studies, and other aspects of their missions.  This would showcase the outstanding capabilities of the U.S. public antitrust enterprise.

  1. FTC Panel

A panel on FTC developments (moderated by Dr. Jeff Eisenach, Managing Director of NERA Economic Consulting and former Chief of Staff to FTC Chairman James Miller) followed Kovacic’s presentation.

Acting Bureau of Competition Chief Bruce Hoffman began by stressing that FTC antitrust enforcers are busier than ever, with a number of important cases in litigation and resources stretched to the limit.  Thus, FTC enforcement is neither weak nor timid – to the contrary, it is quite vigorous.  Hoffman was surprised by recent political attacks on the 40 year bipartisan consensus regarding the economics-centered consumer welfare standard that has set the direction of U.S. antitrust enforcement.  According to Hoffman, noted economist Carl Shapiro has debunked the notion that supposed increases in industry concentration even at the national level are meaningful.  In short, there is no empirical basis to dethrone the consumer welfare standard and replace it with something else.

Other former senior FTC officials engaged in a discussion following Hoffman’s remarks.  Orrick Partner Alex Okuliar, a former Attorney-Advisor to FTC Acting Chairman Maureen Ohlhausen, noted Ohlhausen’s emphasis on “regulatory humility” ( recognizing the inherent limitations of regulation and acting in accordance with those limits) and on the work of the FTC’s Economic Liberty Task Force, which centers on removing unnecessary regulatory restraints on competition (such as excessive occupational licensing requirements).

Wilson Sonsini Partner Susan Creighton, a former Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Competition, discussed the importance of economics-based “technocratic antitrust” (applied by sophisticated judges) for a sound and manageable antitrust system – something still not well understood by many foreign antitrust agencies.  Creighton had three reform suggestions for the Trump Administration:

(1) the DOJ and the FTC should stress the central role of economics in the institutional arrangements of antitrust (DOJ’s “economics structure” is a bit different than the FTC’s);

(2) both agencies should send relatively more economists to represent us at antitrust meetings abroad, thereby enabling the agencies to place a greater stress on the importance of economic rigor in antitrust enforcement; and

(3) the FTC and the DOJ should establish a task force to jointly carry out economics research and hone a consistent economic policy message.

Sidley & Austin Partner Bill Blumenthal, a former FTC General Counsel, noted the problems of defining Trump FTC policy in the absence of new Trump FTC Commissioners.  Blumenthal noted that signs of a populist uprising against current antitrust norms extend beyond antitrust, and that the agencies may have to look to new unilateral conduct cases to show that they are “doing something.”  He added that the populist rejection of current economics-based antitrust analysis is intellectually incoherent.  There is a tension between protecting consumers and protecting labor; for example, anti-consumer cartels may be beneficial to labor union interests.

In a follow-up roundtable discussion, Hoffman noted that theoretical “existence theorems” of anticompetitive harm that lack empirical support in particular cases are not administrable.  Creighton opined that, as an independent agency, the FTC may be a bit more susceptible to congressional pressure than DOJ.  Blumenthal stated that congressional interest may be able to trigger particular investigations, but it does not dictate outcomes.

  1. DOJ Panel

Following lunch, a panel of antitrust experts (moderated by Morgan Lewis Partner and former Chief of Staff to the Assistant Attorney General Hill Wellford) addressed DOJ developments.

The current Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust, Andrew Finch, began by stating that the three major Antitrust Division initiatives involve (1) intellectual property (IP), (2) remedies, and (3) criminal enforcement.  Assistant Attorney General Makan Delrahim’s November 2017 speech explained that antitrust should not undermine legitimate incentives of patent holders to maximize returns to their IP through licensing.  DOJ is looking into buyer and seller cartel behavior (including in standard setting) that could harm IP rights.  DOJ will work to streamline and improve consent decrees and other remedies, and make it easier to go after decree violations.  In criminal enforcement, DOJ will continue to go after “no employee poaching” employer agreements as criminal violations.

Former Assistant Attorney General Tom Barnett, a Covington & Burling Partner, noted that more national agencies are willing to intervene in international matters, leading to inconsistencies in results.  The International Competition Network is important, but major differences in rhetoric have created a sense that there is very little agreement among enforcers, although the reality may be otherwise.  Muted U.S. agency voices on the international plane and limited resources have proven unfortunate – the FTC needs to engage better in international discussions and needs new Commissioners.

Former Counsel to the Assistant Attorney Eric Grannon, a White & Case Partner, made three specific comments:

(1) DOJ should look outside the career criminal enforcement bureaucracy and consider selecting someone with significant private sector experience as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Criminal Enforcement;

(2) DOJ needs to go beyond merely focusing on metrics that show increased aggregate fines and jail time year-by-year (something is wrong if cartel activities and penalties keep rising despite the growing emphasis on inculcating an “anti-cartel culture” within firms); and

(3) DOJ needs to reassess its “amnesty plus” program, in which an amnesty applicant benefits by highlighting the existence of a second cartel in which it participates (non-culpable firms allegedly in the second cartel may be fingered, leading to unjustified potential treble damages liability for them in private lawsuits).

Grannon urged that DOJ hold a public workshop on the amnesty plus program in the coming year.  Grannon also argued against the classification of antitrust offenses as crimes of “moral turpitude” (moral turpitude offenses allow perpetrators to be excluded from the U.S. for 20 years).  Finally, as a good government measure, Grannon recommended that the Antitrust Division should post all briefs on its website, including those of opposing parties and third parties.

Baker and Botts Partner Stephen Weissman, a former Deputy Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Competition, found a great deal of continuity in DOJ civil enforcement.  Nevertheless, he expressed surprise at Assistant Attorney General Delrahim’s recent remarks that suggested that DOJ might consider asking the Supreme Court to overturn the Illinois Brick ban on indirect purchaser suits under federal antitrust law.  Weissman noted the increased DOJ focus on the rights of IP holders, not implementers, and the beneficial emphasis on the importance of DOJ’s amicus program.

The following discussion among the panelists elicited agreement (Weissman and Barnett) that the business community needs more clear-cut guidance on vertical mergers (and perhaps on other mergers as well) and affirmative statements on DOJ’s plans.  DOJ was characterized as too heavy-handed in setting timing agreements in mergers.  The panelists were in accord that enforcers should continue to emphasize the American consumer welfare model of antitrust.  The panelists believed the U.S. gets it right in stressing jail time for cartelists and in detrebling for amnesty applicants.  DOJ should, however, apply a proper dose of skepticism in assessing the factual content of proffers made by amnesty applicants.  Former enforcers saw no need to automatically grant markers to those applicants.  Andrew Finch returned to the topic of Illinois Brick, explaining that the Antitrust Modernization Commission had suggested reexamining that case’s bar on federal indirect purchaser suits.  In response to an audience question as to which agency should do internet oversight, Finch stressed that relevant agency experience and resources are assessed on a matter-specific basis.

  1. International Panel

The last panel of the afternoon, which focused on international developments, was moderated by Cadwalader Counsel (and former Attorney-Advisor to FTC Chairman Tim Muris) Bilal Sayyed.

Deputy Assistant Attorney General for International Matters, Roger Alford, began with an overview of trade and antitrust considerations.  Alford explained that DOJ adds a consumer welfare and economics perspective to Trump Administration trade policy discussions.  On the international plane, DOJ supports principles of non-discrimination, strong antitrust enforcement, and opposition to national champions, plus the addition of a new competition chapter in “NAFTA 2.0” negotiations.  The revised 2017 DOJ International Antitrust Guidelines dealt with economic efficiency and the consideration of comity.  DOJ and the Executive Branch will take into account the degree of conflict with other jurisdictions’ laws (fleshing out comity analysis) and will push case coordination as well as policy coordination.  DOJ is considering new ideas for dealing with due process internationally, in addition to working within the International Competition Network to develop best practices.  Better international coordination is also needed on the cartel leniency program.

Next, Koren Wong-Ervin, Qualcomm Director of IP and Competition Policy (and former Director of the Scalia Law School’s Global Antitrust Institute) stated that the Korea Fair Trade Commission had ignored comity and guidance from U.S. expert officials in imposing global licensing remedies and penalties on Qualcomm.  The U.S. Government is moving toward a sounder approach on the evaluation of standard essential patents, as is Europe, with a move away from required component-specific patent licensing royalty determinations.  More generally, a return to an economic effects-based approach to IP licensing is important.  Comprehensive revisions to China’s Anti-Monopoly Law, now under consideration, will have enormous public policy importance.  Balanced IP licensing rules, with courts as gatekeepers, are important.  Chinese law still has overly broad essential facilities and deception law; IP price regulation proposals are very troublesome.  New FTC Commissioners are needed, accompanied by robust budget support for international work.

Latham & Watkins’ Washington, D.C. Managing Partner Michael Egge focused on the substantial divergence in merger enforcement practice around the world.  The cost of compliance imposed by European Commission pre-notification filing requirements is overly high; this pre-notification practice is not written down and has escaped needed public attention.  Chinese merger filing practice (“China is struggling to cope”) features a costly 1-3 month pre-filing acceptance period, and merger filing requirements in India are particularly onerous.

Jim Rill, former Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust and former ABA Antitrust Section Chair, stressed that due process improvements can help promote substantive antitrust convergence around the globe.  Rill stated that U.S. Government officials, with the assistance of private sector stakeholders, need a mechanism (a “report card”) to measure foreign agencies’ implementation of OECD antitrust recommendations.  U.S. Government officials should consider participating in foreign proceedings where the denial of due process is blatant, and where foreign governments indirectly dictate a particular harmful policy result.  Multilateral review of international agreements is valuable as well.  The comity principles found in the 1991 EU-U.S. Antitrust Cooperation Agreement are quite useful.  Trade remedies in antitrust agreements are not a competition solution, and are not helpful.  More and better training programs for foreign officials are called for; International Chamber of Commerce, American Bar Association, and U.S. Chamber of Commerce principles are generally sound.  Some consideration should be given to old ICPAC recommendations, such as (perhaps) the development of a common merger notification form for use around the world.

Douglas Ginsburg, Senior Judge (and former Chief Judge) of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and former Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust, spoke last, focusing on the European Court of Justice’s Intel decision, which laid bare the deficiencies in the European Commission’s finding of a competition law violation in that matter.

In a brief closing roundtable discussion, Roger Alford suggested possible greater involvement by business community stakeholders in training foreign antitrust officials.

  1. Conclusion

Heritage Foundation host Alden Abbott closed the proceedings with a brief capsule summary of panel highlights.  As in prior years, the Fourth Annual Heritage Antitrust Conference generated spirited discussion among the brightest lights in the American antitrust firmament on recent developments and likely trends in antitrust enforcement and policy development, here and abroad.

In antitrust, antitrust division, federal trade commission, truth on the market
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Existing Antitrust Tools are Perfectly Adequate to Deal with the New “Winner-Take-All” Economy

Alden Abbott —  26 January 2018

Are current antitrust tools fully adequate to cope with the challenges posed by giant online “digital platforms” (such as Google, Amazon, and Facebook)?  Yes.  Should antitrust rules be expanded to address broader social concerns that transcend consumer welfare and economic efficiency, such as income inequality and allegedly excessive big business influence on the political process?  No.  For more details, see my January 23 Heritage Foundation Legal Memorandum entitled Antitrust and the Winner-Take-All Economy.  That Memo concludes:

[T]he U.S. antitrust laws as currently applied, emphasizing sound economics, are fully capable of preventing truly anticompetitive behavior by major Internet platform companies and other large firms. But using antitrust to attack companies based on non-economic, ill-defined concerns about size, fairness, or political clout is unwarranted, and would be a recipe for reduced innovation and economic stagnation. Recent arguments trotted out to use antitrust in such an expansive manner are baseless, and should be rejected by enforcers and by Congress.

In antitrust, truth on the market ,
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Hear from Past and Present Antitrust Agency Leaders at the Fourth Annual Heritage Antitrust Conference, January 23, 2018: Still Time to Register!

Alden Abbott —  16 January 2018

On January 23rd, for the fourth consecutive year, The Heritage Foundation will host a one-day antitrust conference that focuses on major thematic developments in domestic and international antitrust policy.  The conference pulls together leaders of the antitrust bar and top current and former Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Justice Department (DOJ) officials to provide an overarching perspective of antitrust trends that will affect the business community over the next year.

This year’s program, entitled “Trump Antitrust Policy after One Year,” will as usual feature an opening keynote address by former FTC Chairman and scholar extraordinaire Professor Bill Kovacic, followed by three separate panels covering FTC, DOJ, and international developments, respectively.  A light lunch will be served following the FTC panel.  The program will be held in the Allison Auditorium at The Heritage Foundation headquarters in the District of Columbia.

You can find out more about the program, and register to attend, here.  (If you cannot attend in person, you will be able to see it streamed online at https://www.heritage.org/events.)

I hope to see you there!

In truth on the market
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