TOTM

Too Big To Fail as an Antitrust Concept

There has been a lot of talk recently about the possibility that lax antitrust gave rise to the financial crisis or that antitrust could be used as a proactive weapon to prevent mergers and acquisitions that would create entities “too big to fail.” George Priest recently took AAG Varney to task for suggesting that there was a consensus amongst economists that lax antitrust contributed to the current financial situation.  Simon Johnson has been pushing the idea that antitrust is an appropriate tool for dealing with the type of financial risk imposed by businesses that become so large that their failure would cause substantial damage throughout the economy.  The idea might be catching on.  Frank Pasquale recently cited to Johnson’s work favorably.  The idea has also been favorably cited by Commissioner Rosch.

Read the full piece here.