John Kwoka

The draft Merger Guidelines largely replace the consumer welfare standard of the Chicago School with the lessening of competition principle found in the 1914 Clayton Act. This shift would enable the Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice Antitrust Division to utilize the full extent of modern economics to respond to rising concentration and its harmful effects, writes John Kwoka.

Most mergers in industries with only a handful of competitors are anticompetitive, so why don’t we block them? The fix is to use a structural presumption to lower the burden for regulators.

The time has come to update our antitrust enforcement infrastructure. There is a renewed focus on the effectiveness of antitrust policy, specifically merger review. Growing...