Post by Dave on Mar 10, 2021 3:05:45 GMT -8
Good morning. The pre-market is a little red this morning at -$0.29 at the moment. Let’s hope that this fades into green by the open.
Biden Reportedly Plans to Name Tech Critic Lina Khan to FTC
Update: At 9:00 the pre-market had switched to green +$0.48.
Biden Reportedly Plans to Name Tech Critic Lina Khan to FTC
Last week, the White House named Columbia University law school professor Tim Wu to the National Economic Council. Wu has warned that he sees risks in the concentration of power in the hands of a few very large technology companies. That was the topic of his 2018 book, The Curse of Bigness: Antitrust in the New Gilded Age, which specifically calls out the risks attached to the market power held by Google, owned by Alphabet (ticker: GOOG); Facebook (FB); and Amazon.com (AMZN).
Khan in the same article called for a bar on allowing Google to steer consumers to its own apps, citing an European Union decision that fined Google $2.7 billion for steering consumers to its own shopping-comparison engine over those run by others.
“The best way to preserve fair and open competition is to make sure that the internet titans do not face any such conflict of interest,” she wrote. “In the American tradition, the traditional way to do this is simply to completely ban any network monopolist from owning businesses that place it in competition with the companies that depend on it to reach [the] market.” She said that just as previous generations used that approach with railways, banks, and utilities, the public now must do the same with Google, Amazon, and “other online monopolists.”
Khan couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. That report, which focused on Amazon, Apple (AAPL), Facebook, and Google, concluded that all four companies had abused their market power.
“By controlling access to markets, these giants can pick winners and losers throughout our economy,” the report said. “They not only wield tremendous power, but they also abuse it by charging exorbitant fees, imposing oppressive contract terms, and extracting valuable data from the people and businesses that rely on them. Second, each platform uses its gatekeeper position to maintain its market power. By controlling the infrastructure of the digital age, they have surveilled other businesses to identify potential rivals, and have ultimately bought out, copied, or cut off their competitive threats. And, finally, these firms have abused their role as intermediaries to further entrench and expand their dominance.”
Khan has written repeatedly in favor of taking a harder-line approach to regulating Big Tech.
In a 2017 note in the Yale Law Journal called Amazon Antitrust Paradox, Khan wrote that the e-commerce giant had largely escaped antitrust scrutiny, asserting that common interpretation of antitrust law “under appreciates the risk of predatory pricing and how integration across distinct business lines may prove anticompetitive.”
Politico reported that FBI agents have been calling Khan’s associates as they do a background check. It said that adding Khan to the FTC suggests that the White House is planning “a big regulatory push once its early legislative agenda runs its course.”
If confirmed by the Senate, Khan would be the youngest FTC commissioner yet, at 32 years old.
“The best way to preserve fair and open competition is to make sure that the internet titans do not face any such conflict of interest,” she wrote. “In the American tradition, the traditional way to do this is simply to completely ban any network monopolist from owning businesses that place it in competition with the companies that depend on it to reach [the] market.” She said that just as previous generations used that approach with railways, banks, and utilities, the public now must do the same with Google, Amazon, and “other online monopolists.”
Khan couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. That report, which focused on Amazon, Apple (AAPL), Facebook, and Google, concluded that all four companies had abused their market power.
“By controlling access to markets, these giants can pick winners and losers throughout our economy,” the report said. “They not only wield tremendous power, but they also abuse it by charging exorbitant fees, imposing oppressive contract terms, and extracting valuable data from the people and businesses that rely on them. Second, each platform uses its gatekeeper position to maintain its market power. By controlling the infrastructure of the digital age, they have surveilled other businesses to identify potential rivals, and have ultimately bought out, copied, or cut off their competitive threats. And, finally, these firms have abused their role as intermediaries to further entrench and expand their dominance.”
Khan has written repeatedly in favor of taking a harder-line approach to regulating Big Tech.
In a 2017 note in the Yale Law Journal called Amazon Antitrust Paradox, Khan wrote that the e-commerce giant had largely escaped antitrust scrutiny, asserting that common interpretation of antitrust law “under appreciates the risk of predatory pricing and how integration across distinct business lines may prove anticompetitive.”
Politico reported that FBI agents have been calling Khan’s associates as they do a background check. It said that adding Khan to the FTC suggests that the White House is planning “a big regulatory push once its early legislative agenda runs its course.”
If confirmed by the Senate, Khan would be the youngest FTC commissioner yet, at 32 years old.
Update: At 9:00 the pre-market had switched to green +$0.48.