antitrust and competition

Eric Posner provides his round-two comments on the draft Merger Guidelines.

Simcha Barkai describes the results of new research on the impact of antitrust on U.S. economic activity with co-authors Tania Babina, Jessica Jeffers, Ezra Karger, and Ekaterina Volkova. Enforcement, they find, increases the level of economic activity.

Eleanor Fox provides her round-two comments on the draft Merger Guidelines.

Carl Shapiro provides his round-two comments on the draft Merger Guidelines.

Herb Hovenkamp provides his round-two comments on the draft Merger Guidelines.

Bilal Sayyed provides his round-one comments on the draft Merger Guidelines. To read more from the ProMarket Merger Guidelines Symposium, please see here. For revised Merger Guidelines to retain...

Corporate America makes sport of gaming the tax authorities, especially after decades of budget cuts to the IRS. What dominant corporations make by hiring expensive tax and lobby teams to distort the rules in their favor, smaller businesses, workers, and the general public are forced to cover with higher taxes and worsened services. Competition shouldn’t hinge on who has more pull over the tax rules and how they’re enforced. Decisions made over the next year to modernize the IRS present a historic opportunity to shape a less entrenched and more competitive economy, writes Niko Lusiani.

In new research, Mariana Pargendler, Maria Luiza Mesquita, and Lucas Víspico study how antitrust authorities in the Global South have used family ties to define business enterprises and analyze mergers and acquisitions for possibly anticompetitive behavior.

The United States has recently experienced shrinkflation. Many companies have downsized their products while keeping prices unchanged or even raising prices. Barak Orbach argues that misguided beliefs that failed antitrust policies enabled the decay of business morality have compromised the understanding of shrinkflation. The phenomenon typically arises when supply shocks or other factors inflate production costs in the economy and competitive pressures limit the ability of businesses to raise prices to pass on cost increases.

Cristina Caffarra discusses the animating principles and profound changes brought about by the new draft Merger Guidelines, and argues they will resonate with policy makers and enforcers in other jurisdictions.