, Columnist
Yesterday's Antitrust Laws Can't Solve Today's Problems
Clinton says monopoly power is growing. That may be true. But she's wrong about how to stop it.
They didn't really stop Rockefeller, either.
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One of the central premises of the “new liberal economics,” as described by the Hillary Clinton campaign, is the notion that monopoly power is growing and must be stopped by applying more antitrust law. While it is true that many indicators of market concentration are up, it’s less clear that antitrust law is an effective remedy.
Reading through old cases does not induce great faith in the contemporary usefulness of 19th- and 20th-century antitrust laws. In most areas of manufacturing there is far more foreign competition, if only potentially, than through most of the history of those laws.