The Role of the State

Warner Bros. (“Warner”), a prized and consequential media company, is once again on the auction block, and both Netflix and Paramount Skydance are competing to buy it. Barak Orbach observes that bidders’ appetites for prized media enterprises often foster undue optimism about the feasibility of successfully integrating them. He argues that antitrust scrutiny of any acquisition of Warner would likely underscore the need to modernize certain antitrust doctrines and analytical frameworks.

In new research, Niuniu Zhang discusses how regulators can add “noise” to market data to preclude tacit collusion through algorithmic pricing software without hampering legitimate market practices.

Countries representing 98% of global GDP are exploring central bank digital currencies. They must devise digital infrastructure to maximize competition, writes Jeff Alvares.

In recent research, Yumin Hu, Luca Macedoni, and Mingzhi Xu explore how high income inequality can raise the costs of living. They compare grocery products around the U.S., finding that large retailers will increase the prices for their goods in places where income inequality is also high.

In new research, Vikas Agarwal, Juan-Pedro Gómez, Kasra Hosseini, and Manish Jha explore how companies reward executives for meeting sustainability targets. They evaluate how ESG metrics to determine executive pay create tradeoffs with traditional financial incentives, and what that means for the future of ESG goals.

In new research, Ramona Dagostino and Anya Nakhmurina discuss how political misalignment between state governors and city leadership can affect how cities access financing, particularly in municipal bond pricing and crisis prevention investment.

Live Nation-Ticketmaster has filed a motion for summary judgment to persuade the judge presiding over the antitrust lawsuit against the company that the government has not turned up enough evidence of wrongdoing or harm to consumers. Diana L. Moss refutes the motion’s main arguments and defends the government’s lawsuit.

Nancy L. Rose and Jonathan Sallet respond to a recent article by Herbert Hovenkamp, in which he argues that the merger-efficiencies defense, which requires merging parties to demonstrate competitive benefits of a merger in order to rebut a prima facie case of harm presented by plaintiffs, is too burdensome and runs contrary to empirical evidence.

Summary Teaser: In a new working paper, Jakob Beuschlein, Jósef Sigurdsson, and Horng Chern Wong find that workers at acquired firms in Sweden experience wage cuts. Rather than from the increased monopsony power of employers, these wage cuts are due to rent redistribution toward higher CEO pay.

Matt Lucky reviews two new books exploring why digital platforms are failing users and how to rediscover the internet’s original promises of an abundance of high-quality and cheap services: Cory Doctorow’s Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It and Tim Wu’s The Age of Extraction: How Tech Platforms Conquered the Economy and Threaten Our Future Prosperity.