The Role of the State

For the first time in the history of mobile phones, Americans will be able to access a variety of app stores on Android phones, following game developer Epic Games’ legal victory over Google. Fiona Scott Morton and Nick Jacobson discuss how Google may try to undermine the court’s remedies to stifle competition and how both American and European regulators can respond to protect competition.

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.

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.

Countries representing 98% of global GDP are exploring central bank digital currencies. They must devise digital infrastructure to maximize competition, writes Jeff Alvares.

In recent research, Yumin Hu, Luca Macedoni, and Mingzhi Xu explore how high income inequality can raise the costs of living. They compare grocery products around the U.S., finding that large retailers will increase the prices for their goods in places where income inequality is also high.

In new research, Vikas Agarwal, Juan-Pedro Gómez, Kasra Hosseini, and Manish Jha explore how companies reward executives for meeting sustainability targets. They evaluate how ESG metrics to determine executive pay create tradeoffs with traditional financial incentives, and what that means for the future of ESG goals.

In new research, Ramona Dagostino and Anya Nakhmurina discuss how political misalignment between state governors and city leadership can affect how cities access financing, particularly in municipal bond pricing and crisis prevention investment.