Economics in Antitrust Enforcement and the Private Benefit of Scholarly Commentators

16 Pages Posted: 16 Jan 2017 Last revised: 19 Jan 2017

See all articles by Jan Broulík

Jan Broulík

Amsterdam Centre for European Law and Governance

Date Written: January 13, 2017

Abstract

Academic commentators maintain advocating more economics in antitrust enforcement than it would be optimal from the societal point of view. It has been proposed that this advocacy arises from the private benefit that the commentators obtain from the enforcement use of economics. This article examines the plausibility of this proposition. It compiles the available data on the size of business and employment opportunities for antitrust practitioners to show that there is a significant private benefit associated with the enforcement use of economics. Because the boundary between antitrust practice and academia is permeable, this private benefit is capable of distorting the scholarly commentary. Literature on an analogous issue advances that such distortions of the academic discourse arising from practice-related benefits enjoyed by academic commentators are not rare. Additional incentives come from big businesses that benefit from the excessive use of economics and, therefore, reward commentary that advocates it. The proposition therefore appears to be reasonably plausible.

Keywords: antitrust economics; political economy; public choice

JEL Classification: K00, K20, K21, K40, K42, L00, L40

Suggested Citation

Broulík, Jan, Economics in Antitrust Enforcement and the Private Benefit of Scholarly Commentators (January 13, 2017). TILEC Discussion Paper No. 2017-001, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2898753 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2898753

Jan Broulík (Contact Author)

Amsterdam Centre for European Law and Governance ( email )

P.O.Box 1030
Amsterdam, 1000 BA
Netherlands

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