Antitrust laws are a scam

[bwv 1080]

Saw today that the EU is still going after Microsoft. Antitrust is a scam whereby competitors can petition the government to intevene to protect their interests. Can anyone demonstrate a case where actual consumers have been harmed - even by classic cases like Standard Oil?




The Causes and Consequences of Antitrust: The Public Choice Perspective, edited by Fred S. McChesney and William F. Shughart II, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 379 pages, $66.00/$32.95 paper

Thirty years ago, economists began to analyze carefully the effects of government regulation and found, almost without exception, that such regulation reduced competition and raised prices. Whether in surface transportation, airline seats, milk, or cab rides, the story was the same. One big exception was natural gas, where a too-low federal price ceiling created a serious shortage instead.

It was only natural that curious economists would widen the net to look at the effects of antitrust regulation. Beginning in the early 1970s, economists studying antitrust found that it often created monopoly by preventing companies from pricing too low or expanding too much. Antitrust authorities, they found, often were more interested in preserving competitors than in preserving competition.

Economists also found that regulated industries often lobbied for the anti-competitive regulation in the first place. Consumers never asked for an Interstate Commerce Commission to prevent new truckers from entering the business. Nor had consumers been heard from when the federal government set up milk marketing boards to restrict the supply of milk and drive up the price. The main players were truckers and milk producers, who wanted to limit competition. Quite naturally, then, some curious economists began to wonder how we ended up with antitrust laws.

Fred S. McChesney, a law and economics professor at Emory University, and William F. Shughart II, an economics professor at the University of Mississippi, were two pioneers in antitrust research. This book brings together, in one place, evidence of the harm done by antitrust and of the special interest lobbying that led to its adoption and that guides the antitrust agencies' policies. The book is a major step towards correcting a deficiency in economists' and the public's understanding of antitrust.

Part One presents evidence by various researchers that is inconsistent with the standard public interest view of antitrust. Part One's most striking article is Paul Rubin's "What Do Economists Think of Antitrust?: A Random Walk Down Pennsylvania Avenue." Rubin uses a simple but marvelously clever methodology. He takes all the antitrust articles cited in a major industrial organization textbook by Frederic M. Scherer and David Ross. Rubin notes that Scherer is a leading proponent of antitrust and that, therefore, any bias in the cases cited in the book would be in favor of cases where the antitrust authorities were acting to preserve or increase competition.

Rubin then summarizes each case and categorizes them, by the standards of the author writing about the case, as justified or unjustified. The bottom line: In the view of the economists writing the articles, there were 14 justified cases and nine unjustified ones. Moreover, the plaintiffs won a lower percentage of the justified cases (64 percent) than of the unjustified ones (78 percent). Concludes Rubin: "Factors other than a search for efficiency must be driving antitrust policy."

The articles in Part Two assess antitrust's actual effects. George Bittlingmayer examines the great merger wave between 1898 and 1902, in which more than 2,500 manufacturing and mining firms disappeared through merger. Economists have long been puzzled about what caused that wave: Bittlingmayer argues it was caused by antitrust. You probably thought that antitrust enforcement prevented mergers. It does now, but as Bittlingmayer shows, the Sherman Antitrust Act was used to prevent companies from making loose cartel agreements. So, prevented from colluding, the firms merged.

Not that cartels necessarily hurt consumers. In line with a recent strand in economics that University of Chicago economist Lester Telser began, Bittlingmayer argues that cartels can be an efficient way of preventing ruinous competition when firms' fixed costs are very high and their variable costs are low. If you doubt that that's a problem, take a look at airline profits since deregulation. The added cost of taking another passenger is close to zero, which is why airlines get into so many price wars and are often on the verge of bankruptcy.

Another article in Part Two by two of my former students, Espen Eckbo and Peggy Wier, finds that antitrust authorities do block mergers, but that the ones they block are pro-competitive. Eckbo and Wier point out that if a merger is pro-competitive--and therefore likely to reduce profits, to the benefit of consumers--then the stock price of the once-competing firms should fall when the merger is announced and rise when the government prevents it. This, they find, is what happened.

So promoting efficiency doesn't motivate the antitrust authorities to pursue cases. Part Three investigates what does. "Antitrust Pork Barrel" by Roger Faith, Donald Leavens, and Robert Tollison argues that political influence is an important determinant of actions by the Federal Trade Commission. Bottom line: If you want the FTC to hassle your competitor, move your firm to a congressional district whose member sits on a committee that controls the FTC's budget.

The real dynamite in Part Three is in the opening footnote to "Bureaucracy and Politics in FTC Merger Challenges" by Malcolm Coate, Richard Higgins, and McChesney. The footnote states: "We have reluctantly agreed to recite the following, written by the FTC's Office of General Counsel:" and then goes on to quote a statement that the FTC disagrees with the article's method and conclusions. Although McChesney doesn't write this in the book, he told me that the FTC's general counsel threatened to bring criminal charges against him if he "published" (the legal term for making public, which would include sending off the manuscript to a journal) his results. The FTC claimed McChesney was using confidential data but cast doubt on its own statement by agreeing to allow publication with the disclaimer.

The article shows that congressional pressure does affect the FTC's decisions to challenge mergers, something that even a casual observer of the Washington scene will have noticed, but a conclusion for which little econometric evidence had ever been presented. They show that one additional congressional hearing raises the probability of a merger challenge by 4.2 percentage points. Moreover, by separating out the effect of the FTC's lawyers' and economists' recommendations to the commission, the authors show that the political influence occurs at the commissioner level, not below. No wonder the FTC was upset.

If the Sherman Act and Clayton Act didn't address a pressing public interest, why were they passed? Part Four addresses that issue. In "Antitrust Before the Sherman Act," Donald Boudreaux, Thomas DiLorenzo, and Steven Parker write that the major groups that lobbied for a Missouri antitrust law in the 1880s--a precursor to the federal Sherman Act--were rural cattlemen and butchers who wanted to "thwart competition from the newly centralized meat-processing facilities in Chicago." They find that between 1880 and 1890, Missouri beef prices fell by 13 percent and cattle output rose by 50 percent. Although the price fall by itself is consistent with the idea that the central meat-processing facilities were a monopoly buyer of beef, the increase in output is evidence against. Disappointingly absent from the book is DiLorenzo's earlier article in which he demonstrated that most of the industries supposedly monopolized by the trusts--bituminous coal, lead, leather, linseed oil, liquor, petroleum, salt, sugar, and steel--had falling prices and rising output in the decade before the Sherman Act.

Also disappointingly absent is Bittlingmayer's article sketching out the connection between increased antitrust enforcement and the 1929 stock market crash. The reader is left hungering for more when he reads, in a related Bittlingmayer article, the following: "Hoover's new approach [on antitrust], which was quickly backed up with stricter enforcement, explains the crash...." When someone dismisses almost everyone's beliefs about the causes of one of the most important events of the century, most readers, including this one, want to see some evidence. When the cause is said to be antitrust, you would think that a book trying to wage a war against antitrust would contain that evidence.

I have always wondered why a profession that is skeptical of airline regulation and trucking regulation has been so unskeptical about antitrust regulation. One reason may be that economists do a large fraction of their consulting for antitrust plaintiffs and defendants.

A second possible reason economists have not been skeptical about antitrust is that few of the economists who have researched or read about the individual trees in the antitrust forest have been aware of how strong a case there really is against antitrust. The Causes and Consequences of Antitrust will do much to remedy that defect.

[MishaK]

Are you serious? You honestly think monopolies are better for the consumer than competition? BTW, you may have noticed, but the article in your post doesn't actually really support your agrument. Also, the genesis of the Sherman Act and the Clayton Act and the entire warped history of antitrust enforcement in the US is laughably irrelevant to antitrust actions under EU law.

[bwv 1080]

Are you serious? You honestly think monopolies are better for the consumer than competition? BTW, you may have noticed, but the article in your post doesn't actually really support your agrument. Also, the genesis of the Sherman Act and the Clayton Act and the entire warped history of antitrust enforcement in the US is laughably irrelevant to antitrust actions under EU law.

Where have monopolies arisen and harmed consumers (aside from those empowered by government mandate)?  At this point how can anyone even allege that Microsoft has any monopoly power? You are agreeing that the genesis of the US antitrust laws was warped and developed to protect the interests of competitors rather than consumers, but alleging that somehow the EU is free from these conflicts?  Do European companies not engage in rent-seeking behavior? 

[MishaK]

Where have monopolies arisen and harmed consumers (aside from those empowered by government mandate)? At this point how can anyone even allege that Microsoft has any monopoly power?

Nobody does. The EU is investigating Microsoft for anti-competitive behavior, not for being a monopolist. Those are very different things. You're missing the point.

You are agreeing that the genesis of the US antitrust laws was warped and developed to protect the interests of competitors rather than consumers, but alleging that somehow the EU is free from these conflicts?  Do European companies not engage in rent-seeking behavior? 

Non sequitur. The legal and political systems are completely different. The kind of political lobbying that was possible in the US in the early 20th century and the economic situation of the time is completely different from what can be done under EU competition laws. They are also administered rather differently. If you want to make an argument that EU competition law has a somehow corrupt genesis, you'll have to make that argument from the history of EU law. The history of US antitrust law is a non sequitur. And even if you show that there is a corrupt history to EU law, that in and of itself doesn't prove that its adminstration is necessarily against the consumer's favor. Your logic is fallacious. It's a typical non sequitur fallacy. You are basically saying "The genesis of the Sherman Act and its administration are corrupt, and the Act is a type of antitrust law. EU competition laws are a type of antitrust law, therefore EU competition law is corrupt." That fallacy is known as affirming the consequent.

As an ardent Opera user, I am in full agreement with the idea behind proceeding against Microsoft. Their vastly inferior product dominates the market for no other reason than the anticompetitive behavior they have been engaging in (bundling Explorer with Windows, denying compatibility information to competitors, purposely causing webpages programmed with Microsoft products to come up garbled on other browsers, etc....). You are mistaken in thinking that competition laws necessarily only exist for the benefit of the consumer. They also exist to protect the competitors. That is why they have a legal cause of action if another competitor engages in uncompetitive behavior. Indeed, they are in a far better position to assess potential damage and file suit before the damage gets worse. By the time the consumer is hurt, the anticompetitive behavior and its effects may be irreversible as competitors may have gone out of business.

[Gustav]

I am not going to comment on the nature of monopolies, and their legalities or whatever. I just want to point out that Microsoft is NOT a monopoly.

At least not now, since you can buy different brands of Operating Systems, be it Apple or Linux, or whatever... There are also multiple internet browsers out there.

[MishaK]

I am not going to comment on the nature of monopolies, and their legalities or whatever. I just want to point out that Microsoft is NOT a monopoly.

Which is a wonderful conicidence since the EU wasn't alleging that it was.

[bwv 1080]

Nobody does. The EU is investigating Microsoft for anti-competitive behavior, not for being a monopolist. Those are very different things. You're missing the point.

Differerence without a distinction. If Microsoft does not have monopolistic powers then they by definition cannot engage in "uncompetitive practices"

Non sequitur. The legal and political systems are completely different. The kind of political lobbying that was possible in the US in the early 20th century and the economic situation of the time is completely different from what can be done under EU competition laws. They are also administered rather differently. If you want to make an argument that EU competition law has a somehow corrupt genesis, you'll have to make that argument from the history of EU law. The history of US antitrust law is a non sequitur. And even if you show that there is a corrupt history to EU law, that in and of itself doesn't prove that its adminstration is necessarily against the consumer's favor. Your logic is fallacious. It's a typical non sequitur fallacy. You are basically saying "The genesis of the Sherman Act and its administration are corrupt, and the Act is a type of antitrust law. EU competition laws are a type of antitrust law, therefore EU competition law is corrupt." That fallacy is known as affirming the consequent.

You introduced the word corrupt, not I.  If you have a problem with the assumption that businesses will take advantage of any opportunities the law provides to use government to their benefit and to the detriment of their competitors then please elaborate.  My point is that the evidence is lacking for any benefit to consumers for antitrust regulation, whereas the evidence abounds for benefits to competitors.  Opera filed the most recent complaint, not consumers. 

As an ardent Opera user, I am in full agreement with the idea behind proceeding against Microsoft. Their vastly inferior product dominates the market for no other reason than the anticompetitive behavior they have been engaging in (bundling Explorer with Windows, denying compatibility information to competitors, purposely causing webpages programmed with Microsoft products to come up garbled on other browsers, etc....). You are mistaken in thinking that competition laws necessarily only exist for the benefit of the consumer. They also exist to protect the competitors. That is why they have a legal cause of action if another competitor engages in uncompetitive behavior. Indeed, they are in a far better position to assess potential damage and file suit before the damage gets worse. By the time the consumer is hurt, the anticompetitive behavior and its effects may be irreversible as competitors may have gone out of business.

Opera and Firefox are widely used.  Aside from the fact that either company would like the government to intervene to benefit them, it is difficult to see how the situation warrants government interference.  You are presuming that the courts are wise enough to determine what is the optimal arrangement of products and competitors for web browsers and to discern what constitutes "uncompetitive" behavior as opposed to what is just the results of normal competition.  Why should antitrust laws exist for the benefit of competitors?  If consumers are not ultimately harmed, who cares?  All they are is an invitiation to rent-seeking. 

[head-case]

Opera and Firefox are widely used.  Aside from the fact that either company would like the government to intervene to benefit them, it is difficult to see how the situation warrants government interference.  You are presuming that the courts are wise enough to determine what is the optimal arrangement of products and competitors for web browsers and to discern what constitutes "uncompetitive" behavior as opposed to what is just the results of normal competition.  Why should antitrust laws exist for the benefit of competitors?  If consumers are not ultimately harmed, who cares?  All they are is an invitiation to rent-seeking. 

There would be no opera and firefox if the government had not already intervened.  The anti-trust settlement required that Microsoft make it possible to disable Internet Explorer.  Before that Microsoft did not allow users to disable internet explorer and everytime you used another browser a window would pop up reminding you to use internet explorer instead. 

[bwv 1080]

There would be no opera and firefox if the government had not already intervened.  The anti-trust settlement required that Microsoft make it possible to disable Internet Explorer.  Before that Microsoft did not allow users to disable internet explorer and everytime you used another browser a window would pop up reminding you to use internet explorer instead. 

Source?  Disabling IE is not necessary to run either program.  IE gained dominant market share for a number of reasons, most of which were in that it was superior to Netscape and Microsoft had more resources at its disposal.  Opera and Firefox came in later and took market share from Microsoft.  Sure it is conceivable that in the absence of any government interference Microsoft might have made it impossible for any browser but its own to work in Windows, but I doubt this would have happened - their market position is not that secure and the action would only invite more competition for alternative OS like Linux.  I think these procedings will be every bit as absurd in hindsight as the IBM antitrust case that played out between 1969-1982 - think about it - the government wasted 13 years going after IBM and only gave up when changes in the industry made it too ridiculous to continue.

[MishaK]

Differerence without a distinction. If Microsoft does not have monopolistic powers then they by definition cannot engage in "uncompetitive practices"

And pray tell: why would that be? Is monopoly a necessary condition for uncompetitive behavior?

You introduced the word corrupt, not I.  If you have a problem with the assumption that businesses will take advantage of any opportunities the law provides to use government to their benefit and to the detriment of their competitors then please elaborate.  My point is that the evidence is lacking for any benefit to consumers for antitrust regulation, whereas the evidence abounds for benefits to competitors.  Opera filed the most recent complaint, not consumers. 

Opera and Firefox are widely used. 

You're joking! IE has a 76% market share. Yes, informed individual consumers often switch to Opera or Firefox. But remember that large companies are also consumers. And they by and large just buy Windows and put up with the IE that comes with it. Even though it is the least secure.

Aside from the fact that either company would like the government to intervene to benefit them, it is difficult to see how the situation warrants government interference.  You are presuming that the courts are wise enough to determine what is the optimal arrangement of products and competitors for web browsers and to discern what constitutes "uncompetitive" behavior as opposed to what is just the results of normal competition.  Why should antitrust laws exist for the benefit of competitors?  If consumers are not ultimately harmed, who cares?  All they are is an invitiation to rent-seeking. 

Consumers are harmed if competitors go out of business and one company dominates the market because in that case consumers are not offered a genuine choice and one company has an unfair advantage over the others. MS sells IE by bundling it with Windows. Why should I pay a higher price for Windows if I don't even want IE? Why should I be forced as a consumer to pay money for a lousy product I don't want? Why should I waste disk space for a program I don't want and which Windows in most cases won't let me uninstall? If Microsoft drives Opera and Firefox out of the market, then Microsoft has no incentive to improve its product, since it will no longer have to compete against their superior products. You seem to have a philosophical issue with antitrust laws benefiting competitors. Of course they do! Why shouldn't they? Money and jobs and lives are at stake. They will be hurt long before the consumer really sees the effects of a dominant player's anticompetitive behavior. You also seem to have issues with courts determining issues of fact and how they apply to the law, such as figuring out whether indeed Microsoft's behavior constitutes "anticompetitive behavior" under EU law. Again, that's the point! That's what courts are supposed to do! If you seem to think that you are bright enough to figure out that MS did not commit any anti-competitive acts, why do you suppose a highly trained competition judge would not be able to reach the same conclusion if it is indeed as obvious as you allege?

There would be no opera and firefox if the government had not already intervened.  The anti-trust settlement required that Microsoft make it possible to disable Internet Explorer.  Before that Microsoft did not allow users to disable internet explorer and everytime you used another browser a window would pop up reminding you to use internet explorer instead. 

Thank you!

I think these procedings will be every bit as absurd in hindsight as the IBM antitrust case that played out between 1969-1982 - think about it - the government wasted 13 years going after IBM and only gave up when changes in the industry made it too ridiculous to continue.

Non sequitur again. Wrong jurisdiction. The EU is *far* more efficient than that.

[head-case]

Source?  Disabling IE is not necessary to run either program.  IE gained dominant market share for a number of reasons, most of which were in that it was superior to Netscape and Microsoft had more resources at its disposal.  Opera and Firefox came in later and took market share from Microsoft.  Sure it is conceivable that in the absence of any government interference Microsoft might have made it impossible for any browser but its own to work in Windows, but I doubt this would have happened - their market position is not that secure and the action would only invite more competition for alternative OS like Linux.  I think these procedings will be every bit as absurd in hindsight as the IBM antitrust case that played out between 1969-1982 - think about it - the government wasted 13 years going after IBM and only gave up when changes in the industry made it too ridiculous to continue.

They made it literally impossible to remove IE from the desktop and impossible to disable a message that asked you if you wanted to make IE your default browser every time you started another browser.  If you ever relented and said yes it would disable Netscape.  It was only after these obstacles were eliminated that Firefox and Opera became popular. 

By most accounts IE was not superior to Netscape.  IE was based on Mosaic, which is the browser that Netscape had chased out of the market.  Firefox is a direct outgrowth of Netscape, which created the Mozilla project to develop the next generation of Netscape in 1998.

[bwv 1080]

You're joking! IE has a 76% market share. Yes, informed individual consumers often switch to Opera or Firefox. But remember that large companies are also consumers. And they by and large just buy Windows and put up with the IE that comes with it. Even though it is the least secure.

It is the least secure because it is the most widely used.  Any other browser with similar marketshare would invite programmers to similarly attack it.

Consumers are harmed if competitors go out of business and one company dominates the market because in that case consumers are not offered a genuine choice and one company has an unfair advantage over the others.

So tell me where this has actually happened (and in this situation why new competitiors would not arise)

MS sells IE by bundling it with Windows. Why should I pay a higher price for Windows if I don't even want IE? Why should I be forced as a consumer to pay money for a lousy product I don't want? Why should I waste disk space for a program I don't want and which Windows in most cases won't let me uninstall? If Microsoft drives Opera and Firefox out of the market, then Microsoft has no incentive to improve its product. You seem to have a philosophical issue with antitrust laws benefiting competitors. Of course they do! Why shouldn't they? Money and jobs and lives are at stake. They will be hrut long before the consumer really sees the effects of a dominant player's anticompetitive behavior. You also seem to have issues with courts determining issues of fact and how they apply to the law, such as figuring out whether indeed Microsoft's behavior constitutes "anticompetitive behavior" under EU law. Again, that's the point! That's what courts are supposed to do! If you seem to think that you are bright enough to figure out that MS did not commit any anti-competitive acts, why do you suppose a highly trained competition judge would not be able to reach the same conclusion if it is indeed as obvious as you allege?

The courts, nor any organization or person, is not smart enough to assess any of this.  You are proposing that these entities can act proactively - taking actions to avert potential future harm to customers rather than addressing any real current harm.  Of course it is then impossible to prove or disprove that that their actions prevented some potential harm from happening.  

Of course money and jobs are at stake - that is why the government should NOT interfere and allow the marketplace to function.

Non sequitur again. Wrong jurisdiction. The EU is *far* more efficient than that.

Why?  What is so great about them? (and of course there is no entity called the "EU" that decides anything to begin with, there are simply individual government officials and legal professionals acting under their own sets of incentives)

[MishaK]

It is the least secure because it is the most widely used.  Any other browser with similar marketshare would invite programmers to similarly attack it.

BS. It is the least secure because it is just poorly programmed. 

So tell me where this has actually happened (and in this situation why new competitiors would not arise)

E.g., as head-case so helpfully explained, in the US browser market before the first Microsoft ruling that opened the market up to the other competitors.

The courts, nor any organization or person, is not smart enough to assess any of this.  You are proposing that these entities can act proactively - taking actions to avert potential future harm to customers rather than addressing any real current harm.  Of course it is then impossible to claims that their actions prevented some potential harm from happening.  Of course money and jobs are at stake - that is why the government should NOT interfere and allow the marketplace to function.

bwv, this argumentation is positively hilarious! Let us summarize your logic: It is self evident that antitrust laws are harmful to consumers. Even if they weren't, since Microsoft is not a monopolist, its behavior ipso facto cannot be anticompetitive. This is self-evident to any clear thinking person like bwv. But for that same reason, it is way too complex of a situation ever to be understood by boneheaded lawyers and judges and EU commissioners, so this case should never go to court. Furthermore, because antitrust laws don't really help consumers, rulings in this area, at best, address hypothetical future harm to consumers. This is precisely why competitors (who are actually suffering immediate, measurable monetary harm) should absolutely not have standing to bring suit under competition laws. Perfectly logical, ain't it?

Why?  What is so great about them?

Unlike US government institutions, the EU institutions are well funded and their employees well trained and motivated. They accomplish very quick turnarounds. I have dealt with them myself.

(and of course there is no entity called the "EU" that decides anything to begin with, there are simply individual government officials and legal professionals acting under their own sets of incentives)

By that logic, there is no entity called "Microsoft" either, just individual company employees acting under their own sets of incentives. Which makes me wonder why you care so deeply about the fate of MS.

[bwv 1080]

bwv, this argumentation is positively hilarious! Let us summarize your logic: It is self evident that antitrust laws are harmful to consumers. Even if they weren't, since Microsoft is not a monopolist, its behavior ipso facto cannot be anticompetitive. This is self-evident to any clear thinking person like bwv. But for that same reason, it is way too complex of a situation ever to be understood by boneheaded lawyers and judges and EU commissioners, so this case should never go to court. Furthermore, because antitrust laws don't really help consumers, rulings in this area, at best, address hypothetical future harm to consumers. This is precisely why competitors (who are actually suffering immediate, measurable monetary harm) should absolutely not have standing to bring suit under competition laws. Perfectly logical, ain't it?

Yes it is actually, even with your lame attempt to make it not (of course you are deliberately twisting my words - something I have not done to you).  The point is that the evidence is lacking that antitrust laws benefit consumers.  Therefore at best government action will do no harm, and at worst it will harm consumers.  Companies in a market economy do not have a cause for legal action if they lose business to a competitor and claiming some hypothetical future harm to consumers does not alter this fact.  Industries like software are too complex and dynamic for either government agencies or courts to determine what are the proper forms of competition.  Antitrust regulations are a way for businesses to engage in rent-seeking. 

Unlike US government institutions, the EU institutions are well funded and their employees well trained and motivated. They accomplish very quick turnarounds. I have dealt with them myself.

Wow, your anecdotal evidence is overwhelming

By that logic, there is no entity called "Microsoft" either, just individual company employees acting under their own sets of incentives. Which makes me wonder why you care so deeply about the fate of MS.

I do not care about MS, and yes it is a mistake to think about any organization as anything else than a group of individuals acting under incentives.  Why else would Merrill Lynch have blown itself up in subprime mortgages?

[MishaK]

Yes it is actually, even with your lame attempt to make it not (of course you are deliberately twisting my words - something I have not done to you).  The point is that the evidence is lacking that antitrust laws benefit consumers.  Therefore at best government action will do no harm, and at worst it will harm consumers.  Companies in a market economy do not have a cause for legal action if they lose business to a competitor and claiming some hypothetical future harm to consumers does not alter this fact.  Industries like software are too complex and dynamic for either government agencies or courts to determine what are the proper forms of competition.  Antitrust regulations are a way for businesses to engage in rent-seeking. 

If your starting this thread was only for the purpose of stating your point and closing your eyes, mind and ears thereafter, be my guest. head-case and I showed you some examples of antitrust laws benefiting consumers. I tried to reason with you that antitrust laws also rightfully are designed to benefit competitors (As a final analogy, do you think only the audience has a right to complain to the referee if a player commits a foul? Should other athletes not have standing?). You seem to have issues with that and just blindly repeat your dogma from the first post. Have fun in the echo chamber. I'm outta here.

Wow, your anecdotal evidence is overwhelming

When you set the threshold as low as you did...

I do not care about MS, and yes it is a mistake to think about any organization as anything else than a group of individuals acting under incentives.  Why else would Merrill Lynch have blown itself up in subprime mortgages?

So who is the individual then that engages in "rent-seeking"? Look, you can't have it both ways. A company is an entity for you when it suits your argument and it isn't when it doesn't. That's BS.

[BachQ]

Actually, according to the US Supreme Court, the primary purpose of the antitrust laws is to protect interbrand competition, and antitrust laws were enacted for the protection of competition not competitors. 

For example, the Sherman Act was enacted to protect the freedom to compete by curtailing the destruction of competition through anticompetitive practices. Thus, a firm violates § 2 of the Sherman Act "when it acquires or maintains, or attempts to acquire or maintain, a monopoly by engaging in exclusionary conduct 'as distinguished from growth or development as a consequence of superior product, business acumen, or historic accident.' "   See, e.g., Novell, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp.  505 F.3d 302, 315 -316 (4th Cir.2007).

[bwv 1080]

Actually, according to the US Supreme Court, the primary purpose of the antitrust laws is to protect interbrand competition, and antitrust laws were enacted for the protection of competition not competitors. 

For example, the Sherman Act was enacted to protect the freedom to compete by curtailing the destruction of competition through anticompetitive practices. Thus, a firm violates § 2 of the Sherman Act "when it acquires or maintains, or attempts to acquire or maintain, a monopoly by engaging in exclusionary conduct 'as distinguished from growth or development as a consequence of superior product, business acumen, or historic accident.' "   See, e.g., Novell, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp.  505 F.3d 302, 315 -316 (4th Cir.2007).

The point being that one of the main reasons for the Sherman Act was lobbying by local higher cost meat producers fearful of Swift's lower prices for meat that it could ship in its new refrigerator cars.  In that case consumers certainly did not benefit.  The issue is whether the laws are necessary and if they simply provide an avenue for less competitive businesses to gain benefits from the government at the expense of consumers  (think about a worthless company like Novell for example)

[MishaK]

For example, the Sherman Act was enacted to protect the freedom to compete by curtailing the destruction of competition through anticompetitive practices. Thus, a firm violates § 2 of the Sherman Act "when it acquires or maintains, or attempts to acquire or maintain, a monopoly by engaging in exclusionary conduct 'as distinguished from growth or development as a consequence of superior product, business acumen, or historic accident.' "   See, e.g., Novell, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp.  505 F.3d 302, 315 -316 (4th Cir.2007).

The highlighted freedom is one that only other market actors can enjoy. So, indeed, it was designed to benefit competitors as well as consumers.

The point being that one of the main reasons for the Sherman Act was lobbying by local higher cost meat producers fearful of Swift's lower prices for meat that it could ship in its new refrigerator cars.  In that case consumers certainly did not benefit.  The issue is whether the laws are necessary and if they simply provide an avenue for less competitive businesses to gain benefits from the government at the expense of consumers  (think about a worthless company like Novell for example)

A. Why is Novell "worthless"?

B. How would the consumer suffer if he had more choices, even if one of them was from a "worthless company"?

[paulb]

Are you serious? You honestly think monopolies are better for the consumer than competition?

Monopolies such as the 10+ superwealthy families of Mexico that rule with a  hidden iron hand via the Mexican Government Killer Squads.
Yes I would agree these are not very welome business adventures that any sanely and peaceful society would like to have as The Ruler Of The Land.
Does microsoft operate under the same principles as say , the superwealthy that rule most of south and central america? Selfseeking at any cost?

Can you say that Microsoft initiates such practices that depict the aggressive monoplistic organizations which so dominated the business communities of early america?
No one in their right mind could assume Bill gates and a  very small group of business partners who also like Gates worked very hard to get that level of expertise, and then founded Microsoft. A company established solely on the merits of intelligence,  diligence, sacrifice.

Now along comes the EU COMMISSION! And wants to penalize these honest fair-minded (dos Microsoft GOUGE the consumer for  profits?) entrepreneurs, fow what eason?
The EU by issueing that fine set at $613,000,000 back on March 24,2004
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3563697.stm

has clearly shown its true face to the world. But who in the world can act as any sort of over-sight on the EU COMMISSION ( better called The  Organiztion of Europe's Biggest Most Wealthiest Familes, Blood Partners For Life, Royal Kings Of The Land, The Iron Priests  , Rome Resurrected)
The EU Commission is nothing more than a  facade for europes super wealthy. The EU is  a  puppet on strings, which the super wealthy makes to do its dance.

The super  -wealthy know full well that everything is rapidly going computerized and they want a  part of their share. Their blood thrist drives them to all sorts of filth , greedy thoughts never leave their polluted minds. Ever seeking where and how to make more wealth.

Now how shall we perceive this dispicable , contemptuous act of haughty behavoir of the 'EU"/ European "Royalty" upon the un-defensive US company Microsoft? (microsoft is like an ant in comparison with the gorilla size  power structure of  EU "Commision")
In Jungian terms its called the act of projection.
For those of you who are not familar with this fairly common term, means one projects, unaware, unconscious of so doing,  some quality that is within oneself onto some other. Projection of   a group or an individual upon another individual  or group.

Bottom line, the european superwealthy have  shown their bloody teeth to the world, and now we all see what  a  monster She has become!

http://tattoo.about.com/library/blbrandon012905e.htm

The new players on the field are china as 1st, then indonesia and India as 2nd.
And europe is scared of what its future holds against such real giants of real power.
The EU is faced with ever growing unemployment and worse rising fuel costs. And there's no Harry Potter with magical wands to be found in the whole land..

[MishaK]

paulb, you should see a professional about that. That was the most incoherent, rambling and idiotic and just plain bizarre post I have ever read on this forum, and that is quite an achievement. Wow!