The Decline of Antitrust Enforcement

American Antitrust policy has abandoned tight restrictions on mergers and on a variety of business practices, such as vertical restraints indistribution. I argue that the change is permanent for three reasons: 1)rising skepticism about government intervention generally, 2) lack ofdeleterious effects from the new policy, and 3) increasing irrelevance ofantitrust in global markets. Due process considerations will reinforce thechange in policy. New technologies may, however, revive traditionalantitrust concern with price fixing.