The wealth and technological sophistication of modern society are readily apparent. Less visible, but no less remarkable, is its ability to coordinate the actions of billions of people who know almost nothing about one another’s circumstances.
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Truth on the Market
Truth on the Market is a blog published by Truth on the Market that explores the intersection of law, economics, and policy. It covers topics such as institutional frameworks for trade and enforcement, competition law with a focus on EU regulations, sports governance and its legal-economic implications, broadcasting and media regulation including FCC policies, and challenges in antitrust analysis of digital and streaming markets. The blog discusses how economic theory informs legal rules and enforcement, the role of private and public institutions in market regulation, and the evolving legal landscape in areas like vertical restraints, market definition, and platform economics.
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Fine Print for Every Price: The FTC’s One-Size-Fits-All Guidance
My first post at Truth on the Market—where I called myself a “Refugee from the FTC”—briefly discussed an advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) published in the Federal Register by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) under Chair…
A Fee Too Far: Merchants, Surcharges, and the War on Plastic
Earlier this summer, my family took a vacation to Ocean City, Maryland, where the boardwalk offered ice cream, souvenirs, and an unexpected lesson in payment economics. Every retailer we visited added a surcharge of at least 3% for credit-card payments…
Four Patents and a Time Machine: CareFirst and the Perils of Backdated Antitrust
By Alden Abbott
Four patents can carry a lot of antitrust baggage—especially when they come tucked inside a portfolio of more than 500. In CareFirst of Maryland v. Johnson & Johnson, health insurer CareFirst alleges that Johnson & Johnson unlawfully acquired and later…
‘Deliberation as Self-Discovery and Institutions for Political Speech,’ by Catherine Hafer and Dimitri Landa
The We Are What We Read series is, in part, about what defines the field of law & economics. The field’s natural home lies in applications that are, well, economic. Hence its longstanding—and now standard—role in contracts, corporations, antitrust,…
Premium, Regular, or Collusive? Brazil’s Aprix Case Tests Algorithmic Pricing
Few antitrust investigations find their theory of harm laid out in the target’s sales brochure. Brazil’s investigation of Aprix, a startup that sells pricing software to gas stations, nearly managed the feat. One of the company’s promotional brochures introduced prospective…
Fiber Freeze: How Maple Grove Made a Cable Franchise the Price of Broadband
The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Build America Agenda rests on a simple premise: Stop making it so hard to build. Federal and state policymakers have spent years reducing permitting delays, resolving pole-attachment disputes, and easing access to public rights-of-way—the public…
Cartels With Benefits: The Trouble With Extending Labor’s Antitrust Exemption
By Alden Abbott
Antitrust law’s usual instruction to competitors who agree on price is admirably brief: Don’t. Labor law makes a deliberate exception for employees who bargain collectively. Advocates now want that exception to cover at least some independent contractors, including rideshare drivers,…
Google, the Unruh Act, and the Legal Risk of Knowing Your Audience
By Ben Sperry
Advertising’s oldest rule is simple: Know your audience. In California, following it may get an online platform sued. Show retirement-home ads to seniors and student discounts to college students, and sensible targeting can suddenly look like unlawful discrimination.
That question…
The Data Center Chessboard Has No Pause Button
The whole country ostensibly wants America to win the artificial intelligence (AI) race. A striking number, however, would prefer someone else’s town to host the data centers, power plants, transmission lines, and cooling systems required to run it.
Adam Smith…