Recent”Antitrust SummitFederal Trade Commission Chairwoman Lina Khan painted a grim picture of the American economy. She warned that, among other things, people’s economic freedoms are being eroded. The next obvious question is, “By whom, Ms. Khan?”
Khan’s comments highlight legitimate concerns about bad actors lurking throughout the economy. But the academic legal theories she aggressively pushes to get entrepreneurs and businesses to comply have led the FTC to respond disproportionately to its mandate as a consumer protection agency. A recently released report shows that these misplaced priorities are clearly harming American consumers. FTC Performance Report Made abundantly clear.
What has been gained by focusing limited government resources on this issue for American consumers?
Under Khan, the FTC has embarked on a string of headline-grabbing litigation, rulemaking and merger reviews, complete with fiery media interviews. Jon Stewart from “The Daily Show”.
Recent”Junk Fee” is a classic example of the FTC using its authority for the wrong purposes. Essentially, so-called junk fees are the price we pay for junk regulation. Base fees imposed on consumers are government regulation that raises costs. If the FTC wanted to fully inform consumers, they would make the regulatory costs we pay for every good and service we buy more transparent. Junk fee regulation has the opposite effect, adding additional compliance and administrative costs to companies, which are then passed on to consumers again.
These proposed sentences are intended to distract the public from what is really happening: our economy is in decline, the prices of goods and services are soaring, Prices have risen by more than 15% Prices of everyday necessities have reached record highs.
Rather than protecting consumers, the FTC is focused on pushing claims that distract Americans from the real problems plaguing our country. These efforts are a huge waste of the FTC’s time.
What has this concentrated focus of limited government resources done to American consumers? The FTC’s most high-profile antitrust cases against Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta/Facebook have been defeated and widely acknowledged to be flawed. According to a recent survey of antitrust professors in the Yale Law Journal, FTC lawsuit against Amazon “It is the agreed-upon choice of the weakest party among five major cases brought by federal antitrust enforcement agencies against big tech companies.”
The Amazon and Mehta/Facebook cases put the FTC in the unfortunate position of filing two of its three lowest-rated cases, all of which have drawn criticism.
Khan made it clear early on that he wanted to bring a number of antitrust cases, leading the New York Times to question the department’s shift in priorities and strategy: “We are certainly focusing our resources on litigation.” Khan told the paper:But so far, the FTC has struggled to make any significant changes to the law or to the welfare of ordinary consumers.
In 2023, the FTC lost a series of merger cases (Illumina’s acquisition of GRAIL being the only exception). Major losses for the FTC included Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard and Meta’s acquisition of Within Unlimited.
The FTC and its allies say some problematic deals have been halted after the FTC filed challenges, and a series of challenges have led to settlements. Critics say the damage to America’s global competitiveness is too great, and that fraud and abuse are commonplace.
Congress has never expressly authorized the FTC to engage in rulemaking on competition issues, recognizing that allowing the agency to simultaneously define and enforce rules could lead to bureaucracy. Going too farBut the FTC is devoting even more resources to lengthy rulemaking processes that introduce novel and capricious interpretations of its authority.
The FTC has 24 pending rules in fall 2022 and 23 in 2023. That’s significantly more than usual. The Clinton and Bush administrations had fewer than 12 in total for the year. FTC rulemaking can be slow and laborious, often taking years. If a court were to overturn any of the rules, would it have been worth chasing the dream instead of focusing on protecting American consumers?
“By wasting so much time on these unnecessary efforts, the FTC appears to have further drifted away from its original mission of protecting consumers from scammers and scammers. Lina Khan is more concerned with garnering attention than addressing the issues that are truly harming consumers, leaving American consumers more vulnerable than ever before.
