In recent research, Brian Broughman, Matthew Wansley, and Samuel Weinstein examine how startups are changing their traditional exit strategies in response to more stringent antitrust enforcement. Many startups are adopting alternative strategies to stay private longer, ultimately raising new questions for competition policy.
In a new NBER working paper, Charles Hodgson and Shilong Sun show that vertical integration is usually good for consumers, except when firms have both the ability and the incentive to foreclose rivals. They use the heavily integrated Chinese Film Industry to show that targeting enforcement to the markets where harm is predictable makes it possible to effectively regulate harmful cases and protect consumers.
In new research, Seda Basihos investigates the relationship between a decline in market competition and global democratic backsliding. She finds that market concentration leads to increasing political power for giant firms—a trend that ultimately erodes democracy levels.
A look back at some of the popular webinars, minicourses, and conversations the Stigler Center hosted in 2025.
Making Markets Work for People: Digital Platform...
Warner Bros. (“Warner”), a prized and consequential media company, is once again on the auction block, and both Netflix and Paramount Skydance are competing to buy it. Barak Orbach observes that bidders’ appetites for prized media enterprises often foster undue optimism about the feasibility of successfully integrating them. He argues that antitrust scrutiny of any acquisition of Warner would likely underscore the need to modernize certain antitrust doctrines and analytical frameworks.
In new research, Niuniu Zhang discusses how regulators can add “noise” to market data to preclude tacit collusion through algorithmic pricing software without hampering legitimate market practices.