Antitrust and Trade Regulation Commons^™

Unilateral, Anticompetitive Acquisitions Of Dominance Or Monopoly Power, Avishalom Tor

Journal Articles

The prohibition of certain types of anticompetitive unilateral conduct by firms possessing a substantial degree of market power is a cornerstone of competition law regimes worldwide. Yet notwithstanding the social costs of monopoly modern legal regimes refrain from prohibiting it outright. Instead, competition laws prohibit monopolies or dominant firms from engaging in those types of anticompetitive conduct that amount to monopolizing or an abuse of dominant position. Importantly, anticompetitive conduct can take place both on the road to monopoly and, later on, once substantial market power has been achieved. Legal regimes nevertheless tend either to ignore or pay only limited …

Back To The Future: Rediscovering Equitable Discretion In Trademark Cases, Mark P. Mckenna

Journal Articles

Courts in recent years have increasingly made blunt use of their equitable powers in trademark cases. Rather than limiting the scope of injunctive relief so as to protect the interests of a mark owner while respecting the legitimate interests of third parties and of consumers, courts in most cases have viewed injunctive relief in binary terms. This is unfortunate, because greater willingness to tailor injunctive relief could go a long way to mitigating some of the most pernicious effects of trademark law’s modern expansion. This Essay urges courts to reverse this trend towards crude injunctive relief, and to re-embrace their …

Rafał Stasikowski, Funkcja Regulacyjna Administracji Publicznej. Studium Z Zakresu Nauki Prawa Administracyjnego Oraz Nauki Administracji [The Regulatory Function Of Public Administration. A Study Of The Science Of Administrative Law And The Science Of Administration] Branta Publishing Company, Bydgoszcz 2009, 336 P., Justyna Nawrot

Yearbook of Antitrust and Regulatory Studies

No abstract provided.

A Decision-Theoretic Rule Of Reason For Minimum Resale Price Maintenance, Thom Lambert

Faculty Publications

This article evaluates these approaches from the perspective of decision theory and, finding each lacking, proposes an alternative approach to structuring the rule of reason governing RPM. Part II sets forth the decision-theoretic perspective, which seeks to maximize the net benefits of liability rules by minimizing the sum of decision and error costs. Part III then evaluates, from the standpoint of decision theory, the proposed approaches to evaluating instances of RPM. Part IV proposes an alternative evaluative approach that is more consistent with decision theory’s insights.

"Per Se Illegality For Reverse Payment Settlements?" Review Of "Unsettling Drug Patent Settlements: A Framework For Presumptive Illegality, Daniel A. Crane

Reviews

Congratulations to Mike on a very fine book. I will confine my comments to Mike's chapter on patent settlements (Chapter 15), which I understand will also be coming out as an article in the Michigan Law Review. Patent settlements involving "reverse payments" are a huge topic on which I and many others have spilled much ink already. Representative Bobby Rush (President Obama's erstwhile nemesis from Chicago's South Side) has just introduced legislation that would ban reverse payments.' I will not regurgitate my entire spiel on patent settlements here, but instead just try to highlight my essential disagreement with Mike …

Lorain, Aspen, And The Future Of Section 2 Enforcement, Xiao Jeff Liu

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

The Sherman Antitrust Act § 2 makes monopolizing or attempting to monopolize a particular trade or aspects of a trade a federal felony. More specifically, Section 2 of the Act addresses a firm's unilateral conduct. Under the administration of former President George W. Bush, a comprehensive guideline titled Competition and Monopoly: Single-Firm Conduct under Section 2 of the Sherman Act ("Bush Guidelines") was adopted in September of 2008 for enforcing Section 2 violations. Under President Barack Obama's administration, however, the enforcement of antitrust laws is expected to undergo a radical transformation. On May 11, 2009, Christine A. Varney, the Assistant …

Iqbal, Twombly, And The Expected Cost Of False Positive Error, Mark Anderson

Articles

Iqbal and Twombly introduced a new standard for pleading federal claims by overruling five-decades old language from Conley v. Gibson. Instead of plaintiffs being entitled to discovery unless the complaint affirmatively forecloses the possibility of recovery, Iqbal and Twombly require a more searching evaluation of the complaint under an ambiguous "plausibility" standard. The policy behind this increased burden on plaintiffs is to prevent the false positive error that burdensome discovery creates. How the plausibility standard from Iqbal and Twombly should operate in the real world is poorly understood. There is general acknowledgement that no clear guidance exists about how to …

Churchill Downs, Inc. V. Thoroughbred Horsemen's Group, Llc "Antitrust Liability And The Horse Racing Industry", Tara N. Hester

Kentucky Journal of Equine, Agriculture, & Natural Resources Law

No abstract provided.

Antitrust And Institutions: Design And Change, Eleanor M. Fox

Loyola University Chicago Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Reviewing Part Iii Of Innovation For The 21st Century: Harnessing The Power Of Intellectual Property And Antitrust Law, Dennis D. Crouch

Faculty Publications

I have very much enjoyed reading Professor Michael Carrier's important new book on the intersection of law and innovation, and greatly appreciate his contributions to the field. In this short essay, I will focus my discussion on my sole area of expertise—patent law. Carrier takes-on the subject of patents in Part III of his book. I agree with most of what Carrier writes. To make this essay more interesting, I focus on some of our areas of apparent disagreement.

Usługi Portów Lotniczych W Unii Europejskiej I W Polsce A Prawo Konkurencji I Regulacje Lotniskowe, Filip Czernicki, Tadeusz Skoczny

Monografie CARS/CARS Monographs

Piąta publikacja z serii Studiów i Monografii Antymonopolowych i Regulacyjnych”, powstała na podstawie raportu z badań przeprowadzonych w 2009 r. w ramach projektu badawczego „Porty Lotnicze” zrealizowanego przez zespół pracowników Wydziału Zarządzania UW oraz pracowników Przedsiębiorstwa Państwowego.

Huddle Up: Surveying The Playing Field On The Single Entity Status Of The National Football League In Anticipation Of American Needle V. Nfl, Constantine J. Avgiris

Jeffrey S. Moorad Sports Law Journal (1994 - )

No abstract provided.

The Evolution Of Trade Secret Law And Why Courts Commit Error When They Do Not Follow The Uniform Trade Secrets Act, Sharon Sandeen

Faculty Scholarship

In the spring of 2010, the Hamline Law Review hosted a symposium to mark the thirtieth anniversary of the adoption of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act. This article was written for the symposium and provides an exhaustive and detailed account of the historical context and drafting history of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act (the UTSA).

Among other stories that it tells, the article explains that the UTSA was prompted by the “Erie/Sears/Compco squeeze.” Because of the Supreme Court’s famous decision in Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins in 1938, it was understood by business interests and their attorneys that the common …

Governing Gambling In The United States, Maria E. Garcia

CMC Senior Theses

The role risk taking has played in American history has helped shape current legislation concerning gambling. This thesis attempts to explain the discrepancies in legislation regarding distinct forms of gambling. While casinos are heavily regulated by state and federal laws, most statutes dealing with lotteries strive to regulate the activities of other parties instead of those of the lottery institutions. Incidentally, lotteries are the only form of gambling completely managed by the government. It can be inferred that the United States government is more concerned with people exploiting gambling than with the actual practice of wagering.

In an effort to …

Much Ado About Possibly Pretty Little: Mccarran-Ferguson Repeal In The Health Care Reform Effort, Christopher L. Sagers

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Since 1945, the McCarran-Ferguson Act (MFA) has shielded the “business of insurance” from antitrust liability, so long as the challenged conduct is “regulated by State Law” and does not constitute “boycott, coercion, or intimidation.” This law, like the dozens of other statutory antitrust exemptions that still exist for other industries, has more or less always been controversial, and efforts to repeal it date back more than thirty years. This Essay asks two questions: (1) what consequences the pending repeal measures might have if one of them becomes law; and (2) what a close examination of this effort might teach us …

Is The Forcing Of Services On Suppliers An Abuse Of A Dominant Position? Case Comment To The Judgment Of The Supreme Court Of 19 February 2009 – Drop (Ref. No. Iii Sk 31/08), Anna Piszcz

Yearbook of Antitrust and Regulatory Studies

No abstract provided.

Creating Effective Broadband Network Regulation, Daniel L. Brenner

Federal Communications Law Journal

The Internet is central to the business and pastimes of Americans. Calls for increased regulation are ongoing, inevitable, and often justified. But calls for "network neutrality" or "nondiscrimination" assume with little hesitation federal agency competence to give predictable and accurate meaning to these terms and create regulations to implement them. This Article's chief contribution to Internet policy debate is to focus attention on the likelihood of successful FCC Internet regulation-a key assumption of some advocates.

The Article analyzes three characteristics that hobble the FCC, which is the likeliest federal agency to provide prescriptive rules. First, the record for the agency …

Network Neutrality Between False Positives And False Negatives: Introducing A European Approach To American Broadband Markets, Jasper P. Sluijs

Federal Communications Law Journal

Network neutrality has become a contentious issue both in Europe and the United States. Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic face digital divides in their society, and are confronted with potentially conflicting policy goals-to incentivize private investment in next-generation broadband while maintaining "neutral" and competitive broadband networks.

This Article compares nascent American and European network neutrality policy in terms of regulatory error costs. Emerging markets, such as broadband, are more likely to be affected by regulatory errors, and these errors have graver consequences in emerging markets than in regular markets. U.S. telecommunications policy traditionally has advanced a trial-and-error approach …

Universal Service In The United States: A Focus On Mobile Communications, Steven G. Parsons, James Bixby

Federal Communications Law Journal

The concept of universal service, providing affordable telecommunications to all citizens, has a long and changing history in the United States. Prior to the Telecommunications Act of 1996, efforts to achieve universal service were largely based on a complex web of implicit subsidies to basic landline local exchange residential service. The Act expanded and codified the concept of universal service and made the subsidies largely explicit. This Article evaluates the possible economic rationales for subsidizing voice communications and find them lacking. This Article argues that the weak rationale for subsidizing basic voice communications makes it critical that U.S. universal-service policy …

Transplanting Antitrust In China: Economic Transition, Market Structure, And State Control, Wentong Zheng

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Article examines the compatibility of Western antitrust models as incorporated in China's first comprehensive antitrust law – the Antimonopoly Law ("AML") – with China's local conditions. It identifies three forces that shape competition law and policy in China: China's current transitional stage, China's market structures, and pervasive state control in China's economy. This Article discusses how these forces have limited the applicability of Western antitrust models to China in three major areas of antitrust: cartels, abuse of dominant market position, and merger review. Specifically, it details how these forces have prevented China from pursuing a rigorous anti-cartel policy, how …