ICLE Scholar Gus Hurwitz on the EU’s Android Decision in the Wall Street Journal
In an interview with The Wall Street Journal Gus Hurwitz explains that moves to restrict the growth of Google products could be bad for consumers:
Because the products made by Google and other tech giants are beneficial to many Americans, any moves to restrict their growth could ultimately be bad for consumers, said Gus Hurwitz, assistant law professor at the University of Nebraska and a director at the International Center of Law and Economics.
“It’s hard to see an antitrust claim successfully being brought and it’s hard to justify regulation against these companies,” he says, “without being really cautious about causing collateral harm to the overall ecosystem.”
Despite Google’s size—the company powers nearly all of the world’s searches, owns the operating system used by 80% of smartphones and is the leading seller of digital ads with 30% of global sales, according to eMarketer Inc.—an antitrust case may be difficult to make under U.S. antitrust laws, which focus on whether companies have harmed consumers. In many areas, Google is driving down prices and making life easier for Americans.