| The Antitrust Religion Contributor(s): Rockefeller, Edwin S. (Author) |
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ISBN: 1933995092 ISBN-13: 9781933995090 Publisher: Cato Institute OUR PRICE: $16.10 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: September 2007 Annotation: Edwin S. Rockefeller, drawing on 50 years experience with the antitrust laws, offers an explanation for their enduring irrationality. He questions whether any sense can be made of our antitrust statutes and their enforcement. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Law | Antitrust - Law | Business & Financial |
| Dewey: 343.072 |
| LCCN: 2007031026 |
| Physical Information: 0.65" H x 6.1" W x 9.3" (0.86 lbs) 124 pages |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: Many successful American businesses have been accused of anti-competitive practices. Drawing on 50 years of experience with U.S. antitrust laws, attorney and author Edwin S. Rockefeller sheds light on why lawmakers, bureaucrats, academics, and journalists use arbitrary and irrational laws and enforcement mechanisms to punish capitalists rather than promote competition. The Antitrust Religion argues that everything most people know about antitrust is wrong. The orthodox view is that antitrust was created to protect competition. But Rockefeller's account is strikingly different. He argues that antitrust in practice has often benefited, not the public, but specific businesses that wanted to take down their competitors. In cases ranging from early antitrust targets like Standard Oil to the more recent IBM and Microsoft cases, he reveals why some companies are punished for being winners in the market. Rockefeller vividly shows how antitrust has been transformed into a quasi-religious faith. He explains that this antitrust religion relies on economic theories that bestow a veneer of objectivity and credibility on law enforcement practices that actually rely on hunch and whim. On issues such as mergers and price fixing, Rockefeller thoroughly examines arbitrary antitrust laws that lead to ill-informed juries and bureaucratic abuse. He concludes that those laws also create a perverse incentive for entrepreneurs to hold down sales volume and avoid improvements in price, quality, and service. Otherwise, such entrepreneurs could become the next targets of the antitrust priests. The Antitrust Religion will greatly assist business professionals, journalists, policymakers, professors, judges, and allothers interested in government regulation of business in understanding how our antitrust laws actually work. |