>Makan Delrahim compared tech giants to previous companies that the U.S. government broke up, such as Standard Oil, and defended the power of antitrust laws to police anticompetitive conduct in the technology sector. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee Hearing On Antitrust And Consumer Policy
>"The current landscape suggests there are only one or two significant players in important digital spaces, including internet search, social networks, mobile and desktop operating systems, and electronic book sales," Delrahim said in a Tuesday speech, according to remarks released by the department.
>Many U.S. antitrust experts have dismissed calls for a crackdown on tech companies, arguing that there’s no consumer harm in their conduct because the businesses offer free or cheap services and products. Delrahim dismissed that line of thinking as blinkered.
>"The antitrust division does not take a myopic view of competition," he said. "Price effects alone do not provide a complete picture of market dynamics, especially in digital markets in which the profit-maximizing price is zero."
>Delrahim argued that "harm to innovation" is also an important dimension of competition that can have far-reaching effects.
>"Consider, for example, a product that never reaches the market or is withdrawn from the market due to an unlawful acquisition," he added. "The antitrust laws should protect the competition that would be lost in that scenario as well."
>He also offered what he called "generalized and non-exhaustive observations about anticompetitive conduct and types of transactions in digital markets that could trigger closer scrutiny."
>In one, he spoke about "coordinated conduct that creates or enhances market power," citing a proposed 2008 agreement between Google and Yahoo to have the former power search ads for the latter. The department told the companies it would file suit against the agreement and the companies backed away, Delrahim said.
>He also discussed the U.S. government’s antitrust case against Microsoft Corp., which he said arguably paved the way for companies like Google, Yahoo, and Apple Inc. to enter the market with their own desktop and mobile products.
Aiden Scott
SELL SELL SELL THAT GOOG GOOG GOOG
Whatever happened to Eric Schmidt's server in North Korea anyway?
Liam Rivera
Assistant Attorney General Makan Delrahim Delivers Remarks for the Antitrust New Frontiers Conference
~ Tuesday, June 11, 2019
“…And Justice for All”: Antitrust Enforcement and Digital Gatekeepers
>Good afternoon. Thank you, Michal, for that introduction and thank you to Barak Orbach and the rest of the conference organizers for inviting me to speak with you today. At the outset, I want to commend all of you for taking up the timely and thought-provoking issue of antitrust enforcement in the digital economy.
>Last October, I had the privilege of discussing antitrust, innovation, and “big data” at the University of Haifa. Since then, the Antitrust Division has been busy. We have invited prominent academics and industry experts into the Department to discuss the digital economy, and we have hosted an advertising workshop that explored, among other things, competition in online and mobile advertising networks. We are working hard on behalf of consumers and free markets thanks to the talented career staff of the Antitrust Division.
>As a patent attorney turned antitrust lawyer, I am delighted to see the many ways that Israel promotes competition to foster an ecosystem of innovation. We in the United States know the transformative power of invention. Sound policy, buoyed by the rule of law, and markets that are governed by competition have allowed the United States to become a “cradle of innovation.” Israel has certainly contributed – and continues to contribute – to human welfare through its incredible technological breakthroughs in medicine, communications, and information science. I applaud you and encourage you to keep pushing forward. All the world over benefits from creativity and ingenuity.
Matthew Gray
>As you well know, digital technologies improve our lives in myriad ways. They can facilitate the delivery of faster, better, and cheaper products and services. They can make transactions more efficient. And digital platforms, in particular, can reduce the cost of market participation for certain kinds of sellers, including workers.
>The digital economy is a fact of life, but it is not all things to all people. There has been robust public discussion about whether the broader economy, undoubtedly transformed by digital technologies, is working well for everyone. While some commenters have tried to dispatch the antitrust laws to address these problems, I do not believe the antitrust laws are bent towards values other than competition. As Justice Black explained in Northern Pacific Railway v. United States, the Sherman Act, our first U.S. antitrust law, is “aimed at preserving free and unfettered competition as the rule of trade” and “the policy unequivocally laid down by the Act is competition.”
>Therefore, the right question is whether a defined market is competitive. That is the province of the antitrust laws.
>Even with these precepts in mind, the current landscape suggests there are only one or two significant players in important digital spaces, including internet search, social networks, mobile and desktop operating systems, and electronic book sales. This is true in certain input markets as well. For example, just two firms take in the lion’s share of online ad spending.
>We know that some markets lend themselves to participation by a small number of firms for reasons having nothing to do with a failure of competition. Even so, digital markets are not impervious to anticompetitive transactions, illegal restraints, and unlawfully obtained or exercised monopoly power. For many years, the Antitrust Division has borne out the task of investigating whether markets in this important economic sector are competitive.
Luke White
>Where there are credible concerns that a transaction or business practice is anticompetitive, timely and effective antitrust enforcement is imperative. To quote Orrin Hatch, the legendary former Chairman of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, “Vigilant and effective antitrust enforcement today is preferable to the heavy hand of government regulation of the Internet tomorrow.” We know this firsthand. After all, the government’s successful antitrust case against Microsoft arguably paved the way for companies like Google, Yahoo, and Apple to enter the market with their own desktop and mobile products.
>Fortunately for us in the United States, the dedicated men and women of the Technology & Financial Services Section of the Antitrust Division are experts on the intersection of competition law and technology, and they have been at the cutting edge of enforcing the antitrust laws in high-tech and digital markets for decades.
>As we think about antitrust enforcement in the digital economy, the key issues that antitrust enforcers must untangle are whether a company is growing due to superior price, quality, and innovation, or whether some transaction or business practice is, on balance, anticompetitive in purpose and effect.
>I do not pretend to have all of the answers today. Nonetheless, I would like to describe some historical analogs and set out a few scenarios that might attract the Antitrust Division’s attention.
>The United States has a long history of trustbusting. Early cases against titans of industry offer valuable lessons for today’s antitrust enforcers. I will briefly discuss three of them.
Isaiah Ross
>The first is Standard Oil v. United States. Let me acknowledge at the outset that Standard Oil is about a decidedly non-digital world. The Standard Oil Company was an industrial giant, however, and it was revered for its patented technologies and commercial prowess. It rose in prominence during a period of rapid change that coincided with the Second Industrial Revolution. It also amplified the value of kerosene and petroleum to consumers in transformative and unforeseen ways. One can draw interesting parallels between those circumstances and the present day. Most notably, we live in a time when consumers are more aware of the power of digital data, which, according to some, may herald the next major Industrial Revolution.
>Standard Oil acquired many refineries in the late 19th century. Refiners that would not sell were underpriced and driven out of the market. Price-cutting is the essence of competition, of course, but the Standard Oil case and later Supreme Court cases helped establish what would become settled law: there are some things that a monopolist cannot do. A company does not ordinarily violate the antitrust laws for merely exercising legitimately gained market power. But even if a company achieves monopoly position through legitimate means, it cannot take actions that do not advance plausible business goals but rather are designed to make it harder for competitors to catch up. In some other contexts, we have referred to this concept as the “no economic sense test.” That test inquires into whether a monopolist’s conduct would make no economic sense but for its tendency to eliminate or lessen competition.
Julian Collins
>Another important parallel for modern observers is that consumers actually enjoyed lower prices during the height of Standard Oil’s dominance. This was likely due to, among other things, a combination of economies of scale, superior bargaining power, and overall declining input prices. It nonetheless demonstrates that price effects are not the sole measure of harm to competition under the U.S. antitrust laws.
>Innovation is also an important dimension of competition. Like today’s tech giants, Standard Oil was pioneering and generated a number of important patents. Scholars have noted, however, that Standard Oil’s innovation slowed as it became an entrenched monopolist.
You don't go to prison for knowing involvement in a conspiracy to undermine the duly elected President of the United States, social engineering populations and conducting open psy ops worldwide, and conducting mass surveillance.
>This doesn't have to do with left vs right. False. >All Americans are against these totalitarian monopolies. No, the left loves them because they are on the same team.
Josiah Cook
>left vs right Anyone speaking in this frame of reference is a shill trying to maintain the current status quo and paradigm. You're losing badly you know that rright:/
Aaron Reed
>tfw shitlibs are now assblasted about anti-trust action and protectionism weird timeline
Nolan Diaz
words often come before actions. Hitler talked an awful lot...then he took action.
Jordan Stewart
This. They are not speaking about censorship.
Caleb Hill
Crapitalists btfo Dismantle the monopolies! Gas the suits! Tribal syndicalism now!
Jonathan Nelson
>words often come before actions Not in the Trump administration
Michael Moore
Dems are trying to make esure that the mainstream media companies don't get antitrsuted next
Ian Baker
It is a left and right thing. Only the right is stupid enough to believe they are winning when they continuously lose.
Justin Robinson
he takes actions but he's not a dictator. He cant control courts, and local governors, etc. He's literally done anything that he can do by law to get what he wants.
Juan Cooper
The media will be prosecuted under the anti-cartel laws, not anti-trust.
Levi Lee
Kill yourself so this world may become a better place
individuals are prosecuted and companies face anti trust.
Gavin Mitchell
We can only hope their stock price tanks too. That would be sweet victory.
Jeremiah Thompson
>he takes actions False. >He's literally done anything that he can do by law to get what he wants. False. He has done almost nothing to deliver his promises. Executive power allows much more than what he has done. He couldn't even be bothered to fire the obongo holdovers and hire his own guys. He had a list of thousands of his campaign workers who could have been hired into patronage positions. He threw the list in the trash and rehired obongo's goons. Never even attempted to use veto power over congress (he has vetoed about 3 things ever). Didn't clean out the executive branch (potus has unilateral power over executive branch staffing).
This is what I was talking about in regard to dumb low IQ conservatives (that's you) not understanding the difference between words and actions.
Carson Butler
The dynamic in that image only exists because conservatives are dumb as dog shit.
Thomas Sanchez
Nah the dynamic in that image has existed longer than any of us have been aive
Jason Perez
>free or cheap services IT'S ABOUT THE DATA THAT THEY GET FROM THOSE SERVICES AND THEIR CONTROL OVER INFORMATION YOU RETARDS.
And conservatives have been dumb as dog shit since the ideology was created several hundred years ago.
Ayden Brooks
It's been tanking like crazy lately.
Matthew Diaz
That IS what it's about though. In fact, I'm tired of treating them like a private "business" when they refuse to be an actual business. They don't have "customers" because that's going to mean they're responsible to someone because they paid them. Instead make it "free" so they can do whatever the fuck they want with your information and don't have to be accountible to any "customer"...
At this point the user needs some kind of legal protection against these companies abusing the data they gather and ruining lives. They aren't businesses and we aren't their customers.
Asher Walker
I like the little plug for Israel, meanwhile Google is entirely staffed by Jews and our tech research is bring outsourced to Israel on Americans dime. What a joke.
Joseph Butler
Idk last time i saw spotted online was at this years bilderberg
Cameron Martin
This should have already been done. I don’t even agree with antitrust laws, but they’ve used it on everything else. And google, YouTube, Facebook etc. are clearly breaking antitrust laws.
Here's an example of the NYT promoting a bogus study to show how "Google has stolen 5 gorillion from NYT"
The NYT is not advocating for the breakup of big tech because they think small, independent conservative journalists should have a voice. LOL
Daniel Bell
It all reeks of setup. Blah blah conservatives get back their platforms, nothing happens to monopolies..... But no more unapproved 9/11, sandyhook or boston bombing videos.... the real kicker will be nothing critical of israel or jews. Screencap this
Xavier Rivera
no they aren't kike. why do you shills act so stupid all the time?
Adrian Price
>no they aren't No they aren't what? Be coherent.
You think the NYT is pushing constant anti-Facebook and anti-Google articles because they give a fuck about freedom of speech?
Jace Nelson
The NYT and the rest of the press colludes with media monopolies to push censorship and to maintain their monolithic narrative.
It's about how NYT literally made shit up in order to make Google look worse.
The MSM is playing both sides against the middle. First, they pressure tech companies to ban conservatives and then they tell conservatives to get mad and support the breakup of tech companies. End result is that MSM holds more power.
Ethan Gonzalez
>They are hoping for a breakup then why wait for a government ass ripping? They can divide any time they want.
