Ensuring the CHIPS Act’s Success by Integrating Competition into Industrial Policy: With the rollout of $53 billion in CHIPS and Science Act subsidies underway, and seemingly endless debate in the business press on its efficacy and implementation, Economic Liberties teamed up with subject matter expert and longtime tech executive Todd Achilles for a new white paper on how to truly foster domestic, resilient semiconductor manufacturing. While commending Congress’ commitment to rebuild America’s semiconductor capabilities, the paper breaks down market structure issues that could undermine the CHIPS Act’s implementation, and proposes complementary anti-monopoly and trade policies to overcome them. The second installment in our Industrial Policy and Competition Series, the paper was featured as an exclusive in The American Prospect, while our accompanying letter to the Biden Administration was covered in POLITICO Morning Tech.
Helping State Lawmakers Throw Junk Fees in the Trash: Economic Liberties’ new End Junk Fees campaign is off to a great start, catalyzing state-level junk fee legislation across the country to protect consumers and honest businesses. Launched at an event featuring AZ State Rep. Analise Ortiz, PA State Rep. and Nick Pisciottano, and National Economic Council Deputy Director Jon Donenberg, the campaign provides resources and advocacy support to help state-level officials and advocates join what is fast becoming a nationwide movement. As of this writing, eleven states—from Hawaii to Connecticut—have introduced bills to crack down on junk fees in the current legislative session, some based off Economic Liberties’ model legislation. We’re already seeing huge victories, as just this week junk fee bills advanced out of the New York State Senate and Virginia State Senate with broad bipartisan support.
Price Fixing by Algorithm is Still Price Fixing: With rising prices top-of-mind for consumers, two Economic Liberties-supported bills were introduced in the Senate to make it easier for enforcers to crack down on algorithmic price fixing. Senator Ron Wyden’s Preventing the Algorithmic Facilitation of Rental Housing Cartels Act aims to make it unlawful for property owners to contract with firms that manage and sync rent prices with housing supply data, and broadly prohibits collaboration between landlords on rent prices, occupancy levels, and more. The bill also answers calls from enforcers and state officials to close a loophole in federal antitrust law that allows corporate landlords to inflate rents amid a widespread housing affordability crisis. Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s Preventing Algorithmic Collusion Act is aimed at cracking down on algorithmic price setting across the economy more broadly. These federal bills follow high-profile law enforcement action from the Department of Justice and state attorneys general to address anti-competitive data sharing practices.
We’ve Got the Fix for Ticketmaster and Boeing: A year after launching the #BreakUpTicketmaster Coalition and channeling mounting frustration with Live Nation-Ticketmaster into a campaign that led to a DOJ investigation, Economic Liberties is moving to the next phase with proposed solutions. In January we released a white paper, “The Case Against Live Nation-Ticketmaster,” laying out a legal roadmap antitrust enforcers can follow to finally rein in this monopoly amid renewed scrutiny. We followed the paper launch with a virtual event featuring Senator Amy Klobuchar, music industry insiders, legal experts, who were unanimous in calling for structural remedies. We know our campaign is working as The Hill reports that the company doubled its lobbying spend in 2023 and the DOJ’s probe is heating up with new document requests. Around the same time, Economic Liberties’ Director of Research Matt Stoller made a splash with another bold proposal to fix a different consolidated headache: Boeing. Stoller argued the corporation should be nationalized and then broken up in his newsletter, which was also covered in New York Times DealBook.
Enforcers Continue Winning Streak in 2024: In an enormous victory for travelers, airline workers, and communities that would have suffered from weakened competition on key routes, a federal judge in Boston sided with the DOJ Antitrust Division in blocking the merger of JetBlue and Spirit airlines. The decision—the first time a judge has flat-out blocked an airline merger in over 40 years—came after months of outside advocacy from Economic Liberties and allies in the anti-monopoly movement, who successfully pushed back against the airlines’ PR efforts in the Associated Press, BBC, Boston Globe, Washington Post, and beyond. Meanwhile, the FTC—hot off its victory against Illumina-GRAIL in Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals—won yet another merger challenge last month, as IQVIA, the world’s largest healthcare data provider, abandoned its acquisition of Propel Media days after a judge ruled in favor of the Commission.
Economic Liberties’ Board Names Nidhi Hegde Interim Executive Director: With comprehensive experience driving the organization’s strategy and managing its day-to-day operations, we’re thrilled to announce that Nidhi Hegde will take over as Interim Executive Director of Economic Liberties! Hegde has served as Managing Director, and previously as Director of Strategy & Programs, since helping to develop and launch Economic Liberties as an independent organization in 2020. We are grateful for Faiz Shakir’s leadership and look forward to working with him as a senior advisor.
Quick hits:
- Rethink Trade Director Lori Wallach’s incredible work building unlikely coalitions to drive a populist and progressive trade agenda was profiled in the New York Times.
- Our friends at Oxfam released an important report linking “a new era of monopoly” to rising inequality around the world, and calling for revitalizing administrative states as a xxxxxx against runaway corporate power.
- As part of a massive coalition of 52 organizations including Consumer Federation of America and the National Consumer Law Center, Economic Liberties submitted a joint comment to the FTC on its proposed junk fee rule.
- Economic Liberties, along with a group of distinguished academics, filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court case NetChoice v. Paxton, arguing that the Court should refuse to extend heightened First Amendment protections to social media platforms that hold themselves out as modern-day public squares.
- Want more anti-monopoly news? Check out our Monopoly Digest, the must-read competition newsletter on the hill.
