 |
 |
|
|
|
| Montréal, 19 février 2000 / No 56 |
|
|
by
Edward W. Younkins
Antitrust laws purport to prevent monopolies and encourage competition. However, since their advent in 1890, history has shown that they do not prevent monopoly, but, in fact, foster it by limiting competition. These laws permit the federal government to regulate and restrict business activities, including pricing, production, product lines, and mergers, ostensibly in order to prevent monopolies and stimulate competition. In actual fact, government has been the source of monopoly through its grants of legal privilege to special interests in the economy. The social cure for such |
|
Microsoft is currently being accused of integrating Windows with Internet
Explorer and bundling them together as one product in order to From a free-market perspective, the situation simply appears to be competition between rivals vying for leadership in sales and innovation. Microsoft, like Standard Oil, is a victim of a political assault because it has innovated, expanded output, and reduced prices. Both attacks were initiated by less efficient rivals who wanted to accomplish through the political process what they could not accomplish in the competitive marketplace. Since Windows and Internet Explorer are Microsoft's property, the company logically has the right to sell them how they choose and to tell PC makers the terms under which they should be sold(1). A look at Some Antitrust Targets The alleged purpose of antitrust laws is to protect competition based on the idea that a free unregulated market will inevitably lead to the establishment of coercive monopolies. However, a coercive monopoly cannot be established in a free economy – the necessary precondition of a coercive monopoly is closed entry which can only be achieved by an act of government intervention in the form of special regulations, subsidies, or franchises. There is no invulnerable monopoly unless it is protected by the state. As long as the possibility of substitution exists, there should be no fear of coercion by monopolists. Rival firms can develop substitutes for the monopolized good or service. In the absence of force, others are free to enter the field and offer similar goods or services. As long as others are free to enter any business of their choice, no firm can get away with whatever it wants to do without facing the prospect of a would-be competitor entering the market. Industrial concentration is most often caused by superior efficiency on the part of one or a few firms in a given industry. It follows that a reduction in the number of competitors is not necessarily in restraint of trade unless it was accomplished through force or fraud. The term
In addition, there is nothing wrong with output restriction. Owners of property have the moral right to use and allocate their resources in what they perceive the most efficient and profitable manner over time in accordance with existing and expected future market scarcities. Pricing has been a particularly popular area for antitrust action. If a company charges a price higher than its competition and it continues to attract customers, it is deemed to have a monopoly per se (e.g., drug companies). If a firm charges a lower price then it is attempting to monopolize (e.g., Wal-Mart)(3). And if several firms charge the same or similar prices they are guilty of price-fixing (e.g., airlines)(4). In the first case, if the prices are set high, then new competitors could be expected to enter. In the second case, the firm is likely to simply be competing, although it is often charged with Antitrust restrictions on mergers and acquisitions have had the effect of protecting incumbent managers and corporate assets from the prospect of efficient reorganization(5). There is nothing wrong with buying out competitors since no coercion is involved. Vertical mergers are often disallowed on the grounds that purchasing a raw materials supplier forecloses rivals of the manufacturer with respect to the raw materials. In addition, it is often alleged that it is wrong for a supplier to merge with a retailer since this supposedly cuts off competition of the supplier regarding channels of distribution. The assumption that increased purchases of a raw material by one firm means that there will be less for others is illogical. As long as there is a demand for a raw material someone will step up to supply it. With respect to suppliers supposedly cut off from channels of distribution, nothing is stopping them from integrating or from finding other retailers to deal with. Prevention of exclusive distribution agreements not only impede the development of the most efficient arrangements for distributing goods and services, an individual's right to voluntarily negotiate the most profitable contracts would also be denied. Exclusive deals are perfectly acceptable – there may be some other firms that would then create competing products(6). Also attacked are tying contracts – agreements between buyer and seller that bind the buyer to purchase one or more products in addition to the product in which he is mainly interested(7). Forbidding the legitimate marketing strategy of all of the package or none of it denies the owner of a product to offer it for sale in the form that he desires. As can be seen from the above, the very practices most threatened by antitrust are the core elements of the competitive process. The effect of antitrust restrictions is to protect inefficient competitors and harm consumers. Pure and Perfect Competition: An Unrealistic Ideal Antitrust regulation is based on an unrealistic economic model that compares the structure of existing markets with an arbitrary abstract ideal of pure and perfect competition that can never be attained in the real world. This model, which is used as a benchmark to judge monopoly and for resource misallocation analysis, includes the following conditions: 1) homogenous and unchanging products offered by all the sellers in the same industry; 2) numerous sellers who individually have insignificant impacts on prices; 3) the possession by all market participants of perfect knowledge with respect to all relevant information; 4) no barriers to entry or departure to and from the market (i.e., ease of investment and disinvestment through equal and costless entry and departure); 5) firms do not cooperate (i.e., collude); 6) no fear of retaliation by competitors in response to a firm's actions; 7) no need for advertising; and 8) economic profits tend toward zero(8). The traditional antitrust model teaches that competitive markets tend toward an equilibrium where price, marginal cost, and minimum average cost are all equal and where consumer welfare is maximized. According to this perspective, consumer welfare could not be maximized if companies advertised, products were differentiated, some firms could achieve economies of scale that are unobtainable by their competitors, or if collusion or high market share could lead to a degree of control over market prices. The traditional antitrust model is irrelevant in a dynamic business world involving imperfect information. True competition is a process, not a structure, in which a profit seeking company, operating with limited information, attempts to coordinate production and distribution with the desires of potential customers.
Real world divergences from pure and perfect competition are not necessarily indicative of market failures. Companies should advertise and attempt to differentiate their products. Competition in a free market includes the process of observing and adjustment under conditions of uncertainty involving both cooperation and rivalry. An innovative firm's lower costs should keep high cost firms out of the market. When price exceeds cost, information and incentives are provided to entrepreneurs to invest resources in a particular line of business. Antitrust regulation undermines the discovery process. Regulators, judges, politicians, and economists cannot know the most efficient organization of an industry including the number of firms it should include, what prices they should charge, and what kinds of contractual agreements they should make with retailers, consumers, and each other. Such knowledge can only emerge through a trial and error discovery process in the marketplace. The essence of a free market is not pure and perfect competition but rather the freedom to compete. The Platonic ideal of pure and perfect competition has been derived from an ideology that is based on the collectivist view that the individual human person is subservient to a greater entity – Society, the State, or Mankind. It follows that private property is not truly private – it is merely held as a trustee for the real owner, It follows that acceptance of the altruist ideal of unrewarded service to others is behind the antitrust model of pure and perfect competition. According to altruist morality, the conduct the model requires is pure and perfect. It portrays a world in which no one can succeed at the same time that others fail(10). Consequently, all firms participate in a process that yields equal benefits to all. The traditional economic theory of antitrust is based on the following philosophical premises: 1) Selfishness is immoral; 2) Capitalism is based on selfishness; 3) Capitalism is therefore immoral and leads to immoral consequences; and 4) Social (i.e., distributive) justice is the moral basis for judging business behaviour. Even advocates of capitalism such as the economists of the Chicago school rely on neoclassical price theory, cost-benefit analysis, and the model of pure and perfect competition as the consumer welfare standard for a firm's real-world performance. These economists' use of tools such as concentration ratios, consumer surplus analysis, market share analysis, Herfindahl indices, Gini coefficients, etc., gives evidence to their underlying altruist premises. Any market that does not meet the economists' altruistic Platonic standard is deemed to be a threat to competition and is censured. Successful businesses are thus punished for not being passive, altruistic servants of society. Antitrust Laws Should be Repealed A review of antitrust laws, cases, and targets, and the economic model upon which they are based indicates that antitrust is largely a failed and discredited policy. Laws allegedly passed to protect customers have been used to punish efficient companies that have increased output and lowered prices. Laws ostensibly designed to restrict monopoly have been used by governments to restrain and restrict the competitive process. Rather than protect consumers, it is possible that antitrust laws are enacted to subsidize and protect less efficient firms from the rigors of the competitive process. Antitrust enforcement can be used as a war against the competitive practices that businessmen can employ to better serve customers. Antitrust laws thus discourage abler firms from operating to the best of their abilities. In essence, the effects of antitrust laws are like those of a cartel – maintaining the status quo by stabilizing prices and assuring each firm that its profits and market position are secure. Antitrust proponents may be confusing the concepts of competition and monopoly power. When a firm advertises, is it competing or being anti-competitive? If a company innovates or spends money on research and development is it competing or creating a In essence, there are two types of monopoly – efficiency and coercive. An efficiency monopoly earns a high market share because it does good work. Such a monopoly has no legal power to force people to do business with it. On the other hand a coercive monopoly results from a state grant of exclusive privilege. The government may: ban competition, grant privileges, immunities, or subsidies to one company; or impose costly requirements on others. What really bothers individuals about monopoly is not that one firm has economic dominance over a product or service, but that compulsion, force, or special privilege is used to prevent other firms from entering the market. There is no social harm in a monopoly if others have an equal right to enter the field of business. There is a large difference between monopoly in the sense of being the sole firm in a market, and in the exploitative sense of using state help or force to keep competitors out. The real robber barons are firms that look to privileges. Only a coercive monopoly hurts people because force, rather than ability, is used to keep others out of the market. The only way that a firm can gain a monopoly without having to fear the threat of competition is through the force of the government. The essence of the monopoly problem is the existence of legal barriers to competition or rivalry. These keep the market from producing, disseminating, and utilizing the information that people need for planning and decision making. Legal restrictions cause monopoly power and prices. By repealing antitrust laws and ending government-sponsored monopoly, the monopoly problem will be handled more efficiently through the market process. It is interesting to note that real monopoly power has essentially been immune from antitrust regulation – government-created monopolies are not made the target of antitrust investigations. Cable TV and local telephone services are monopolies by law. Government licensing and tariff and quota protection restrict competition and produce monopoly profits for privileged private interests. Government-supported cartels (e.g., agriculture, oil production, transportation) result in long-run monopoly profits. Antitrust law is a collection of vague, inconsistent, complex, and non-objective laws that can make virtually any business practice appear to be illegal. These laws are so vague that businessmen have no way of knowing until after the fact if a given action will be declared illegal. Often this system of Antitrust laws are selectively applied. The antitrust bureaucracy chooses cases to prosecute based on their potential to further their own private interests and careers. Antitrust is used to transfer wealth from large unorganized groups of individuals to the narrow, organized interests of other groups of individuals. These antitrust benefits accruing to some (i.e., by limiting competition from their rivals) involve costs that are usually not apparent since they are spread over so many other firms and individuals. Antitrust laws also involve large economic costs. Not only do these include the expenses involved in defending one's firm in antitrust actions, but also in the innovations not undertaken, the competitive strategies not employed, and the mergers that are foregone due to the legal uncertainty associated with antitrust statutes and bureaucrats. 1. Robert A. Levy, February 19, 1998. >> 2. The Wall Street Journal, January16, 1981. >> 3. John S. McGee, « Predatory Price Cutting: The Standard Oil C 1 (October, 1958); and Kenneth G. Elzinga, « Predatory Pricing: The Case of the Gunpowder Tr Journal of Political Economy 73, No. 2, April, 1970. >> 4. George A. Hay and Daniel Kelley, « An Empirical Survey of Price Fixing Conspira Journal of Law and Economics, 17 April, 1974. >> 5. Henry G. Manne, « Mergers and the Market for Corporation Co No. 2, April, 1965. >> 6. Howard P. Marvel, « Exclusive Dea No. 1, April, 1982. >> 7. William L. Baldwin and David McFarland, « Tying Arrangements in Law and Econo Antitrust Bulletin 8, nos. 5-6 (September – December, 1963); and James M. Ferguson, No. 3, Summer, 1965. >> 8. George J. Stigler, « Perfect Competition, Historically Contempl Journal of Political Economy 65, February, 1957. >> 9. George Reisman, « Platonic Compe 10. John B. Ridpath, « The Philosophical Origins of Anti 11. DiLorenzo and High, 1988. >>
|
| << retour au sommaire |
|
