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Antitrust and Competition

A key distinction in economic viewpoints that goes oft-unnoticed is between pro-business and pro-market. A good bellwether to where someone stands on the pro-business/market continuum is his/her stance on antitrust policy: pro-business usually favors incumbents, while pro-market calls for aggressive antitrust enforcement to facilitate competition.
“I would not dispute that even a monopoly-ridden market would be preferable to any economic system trying to operate without any kind of a market. But given the prevalence or the danger of substantial intrusion of monopoly into the market, the logic of the laissez faire defense of the market against state-intervention collapses and there is called for instead, by its very logic, state-suppression or state-regulation of monopoly practices, which one may wish to call, as Henry Simons called it, an instance of “positive laissez faire” or, as I prefer, as an instance of deliberate departure from laissez faire.” Jacob Viner – The Intellectual History of Laissez Faire (1960)

Antitrust and Competition

The EU Draft Merger Guidelines’ Treatment of Capabilities Needs Revisiting

Selçukhan Unekbas
The European Commission draft merger guidelines reorient merger analysis to focus on “capabilities”: how firms compete in current markets and pivot to future ones. However, the guidelines combine “capabilities” with what strategic management scholars call “resources.” This erroneous amalgamation oversimplifies merger assessment and risks inaccurate analysis, writes Selcukhan Unekbas.
Antitrust and Competition

Merger Control Meets Industrial Policy With the New EU Merger Guidelines

Annika Stöhr
The European Commission’s draft merger Guidelines adopt the advice of the Draghi report on European Union competitiveness to tailor competition law to promote goals that have traditionally fallen under industrial, trade, and national security policy. Conceptual ambiguity and the convergence of these policy areas risk undermining consumer welfare, entrenching incumbents, and opening regulation to business capture, write Annika Stöhr and Oliver Budzinski.
Antitrust and Competition

A Simple and Effective Repair for the Google Search Remedy

Steven Salop
The caution of Judge Amit Mehta’s remedy in the Google Search case is unlikely to open internet search to competition. Steve Salop recommends several amendments to the remedy that can improve competition without undercutting the revenue that has benefited Google’s partners to date.
Antitrust and Competition

Antitrust, Big Tech, and the Financial Markets Blind Spot 

Anik Bhaduri
In new research, Anik Bhaduri discusses how current antitrust enforcement is insufficient to address the economic influence of Big Tech companies. He argues that their market power stems from their privileged position on financial markets and their unique organizational structures, and antitrust reforms should therefore be complemented with reforms to corporate and securities law to effectively address the concentration of private power.
Antitrust and Competition

How To Enforce the Robinson-Patman Act Without Reinventing Its Intent

Darren Tucker
The antitrust agencies’ revival of the Robinson-Patman Act risks undercutting legitimate business practices that benefit consumers. However, there is a role the Act can play in protecting small businesses, writes Darren Tucker.
Antitrust and Competition

The Pharmaceutical Benefits Manager Settlements Are a Novel Advance for the FTC and Competition Enforcement

Fiona Scott Morton
In February, the Federal Trade Commission settled with pharmaceutical benefits manager (PBM) Express Scripts. The FTC had sued Express Scripts and two other large PBMs under the long dormant Section 5 of the FTC Act, which targets “unfair methods of competition.” The settlement suggests that the FTC may succeed in addressing the convoluted contracts between PBMs, drug manufacturers, health insurers, and employers that drive up drug prices for Americans. It also opens unchartered territory for antitrust enforcement and the limits of Section 5, argue Fiona Scott Morton and Mariah Smith.
Antitrust and Competition

The DMA’s Google Maps Experiment Shows That Competition Is Not One Click Away

Louis Pape
In new research, Louis Pape and Michelangelo Rossi find that the European Union’s Digital Markets Act’s prohibition on self-preferencing had little effect on the popularity of Google Maps relative to competitors. User preference for the incumbent service appears to outweigh frictional barriers to access.
Antitrust and Competition

If Elon Musk Wants To Compete With Anthropic, He Should Build Rather Than Buy

Ketan Ahuja
Artificial intelligence coding agents provide enormous value to consumers for very low fees. But the market is quickly shrinking with Anthropic in the lead. Only competition, and requiring Big Tech to build agents rather than buy them, will continue to let AI’s value flow to consumers. As such, the courts should ban SpaceX’s recently proposed acquisition of Cursor, writes Ketan Ahuja.
Antitrust and Competition

The TikTok Ban Was a Model for Digital Competition Policy

Victor Jiawei Zhang
Victor Jiawei Zhang revisits the 2025 United States ban on TikTok and explores how it represented a case study of how the government led users to act collectively to override network effects and introduce competition to the digital market. The case study highlights research from his new article, “Digital Antitrust Collectivism,” where he explores the possibility that users’ collective power can invigorate digital market competition.
Antitrust and Competition

Your 401(k) Is Propping Up the AI Bubble

Hera Hyeonseo Lee
Americans’ retirement savings are disproportionately tied to the dozen Big Tech firms that now dominate the S&P. This makes any intervention into regulating Big Tech that risks devaluing them politically difficult, writes Hera Hyeonseo Lee.
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The publication of the Stigler Center at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business

ProMarket is dedicated to discussing how competition tends to be subverted by special interests. The posts represent the opinions of their writers, not necessarily those of the University of Chicago, the Booth School of Business, or its faculty. For more information, please visit ProMarket Policy.