Showing archive for: “Economics”
Crusade Against ‘Big Meat’ Is Latest Example of Misguided Effort to Use Antitrust as Anti-Inflation Tool
As a new year dawns, the Biden administration remains fixated on illogical, counterproductive “big is bad” nostrums. Noted economist and former Clinton Treasury Secretary Larry Summers correctly stressed recently that using antitrust to fight inflation represents “science denial,” tweeting that: There is no basis in economics for expecting increases in demand to systematically larger price ... Crusade Against ‘Big Meat’ Is Latest Example of Misguided Effort to Use Antitrust as Anti-Inflation Tool
Political Philosophy, Competition, and Competition Law: The Road to and from Neoliberalism, Part 1
The interplay among political philosophy, competition, and competition law remains, with some notable exceptions, understudied in the literature. Indeed, while examinations of the intersection between economics and competition law have taught us much, relatively little has been said about the value frameworks within which different visions of competition and competition law operate. As Ronald Coase ... Political Philosophy, Competition, and Competition Law: The Road to and from Neoliberalism, Part 1
What is the Appropriate Role for State Antitrust Enforcement?
In the U.S. system of dual federal and state sovereigns, a normative analysis reveals principles that could guide state antitrust-enforcement priorities, to promote complementarity in federal and state antitrust policy, and thereby advance consumer welfare. Discussion Positive analysis reveals that state antitrust enforcement is a firmly entrenched feature of American antitrust policy. The U.S. Supreme ... What is the Appropriate Role for State Antitrust Enforcement?
Consumer Welfare-Based Antitrust Enforcement is the Superior Means to Deal with Large Digital-Platform Competition Issues
There has been a rapid proliferation of proposals in recent years to closely regulate competition among large digital platforms. The European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA, which will become effective in 2023) imposes a variety of data-use, interoperability, and non-self-preferencing obligations on digital “gatekeeper” firms. A host of other regulatory schemes are being considered in ... Consumer Welfare-Based Antitrust Enforcement is the Superior Means to Deal with Large Digital-Platform Competition Issues
The Contestable Platform Paradox
Why do digital industries routinely lead to one company having a very large share of the market (at least if one defines markets narrowly)? To anyone familiar with competition policy discussions, the answer might seem obvious: network effects, scale-related economies, and other barriers to entry lead to winner-take-all dynamics in platform industries. Accordingly, it is ... The Contestable Platform Paradox
Broad-Based FTC Data-Privacy and Security Rulemaking Would Flunk a Cost-Benefit Test
A debate has broken out among the four sitting members of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in connection with the recently submitted FTC Report to Congress on Privacy and Security. Chair Lina Khan argues that the commission “must explore using its rulemaking tools to codify baseline protections,” while Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter has urged the ... Broad-Based FTC Data-Privacy and Security Rulemaking Would Flunk a Cost-Benefit Test
Why There Needs to Be More, not Less, Consolidation in Video Streaming
Slow and inadequate oversight risks the streaming market going the same route as cable—where consumers have little power, few options, and where consolidation and concentration reign supreme. A number of threats to competition are clear, as discussed in this section, including: (1) market power issues surrounding content and (2) the role of platforms in “gatekeeping” ... Why There Needs to Be More, not Less, Consolidation in Video Streaming
A Coasean Analysis of Offensive Speech
Words can wound. They can humiliate, anger, insult. University students—or, at least, a vociferous minority of them—are keen to prevent this injury by suppressing offensive speech. To ensure campuses are safe places, they militate for the cancellation of talks by speakers with opinions they find offensive, often successfully. And they campaign to get offensive professors ... A Coasean Analysis of Offensive Speech
Breaking Down the American Choice and Innovation Online Act
The American Choice and Innovation Online Act (previously called the Platform Anti-Monopoly Act), introduced earlier this summer by U.S. Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), would significantly change the nature of digital platforms and, with them, the internet itself. Taken together, the bill’s provisions would turn platforms into passive intermediaries, undermining many of the features that make ... Breaking Down the American Choice and Innovation Online Act
Technology Mergers and the Market for Corporate Control
In recent years, a growing chorus of voices has argued that existing merger rules fail to apprehend competitively significant mergers, either because they fall below existing merger-filing thresholds or because they affect innovation in ways that are purportedly ignored. These fears are particularly acute in the pharmaceutical and tech industries, where several high-profile academic articles ... Technology Mergers and the Market for Corporate Control
How US and EU Competition Law Differ
U.S. and European competition laws diverge in numerous ways that have important real-world effects. Understanding these differences is vital, particularly as lawmakers in the United States, and the rest of the world, consider adopting a more “European” approach to competition. In broad terms, the European approach is more centralized and political. The European Commission’s Directorate ... How US and EU Competition Law Differ
Old Ideas and the New New Deal
Over the past decade and a half, virtually every branch of the federal government has taken steps to weaken the patent system. As reflected in President Joe Biden’s July 2021 executive order, these restraints on patent enforcement are now being coupled with antitrust policies that, in large part, adopt a “big is bad” approach in ... Old Ideas and the New New Deal
