When the State Harms Competition ― The Role for Competition Law

This article is about the actual and potential use of antitrust (or competition) laws to proscribe or override acts or measures of the state that significantly and unnecessarily harm market competition. Anticompetitive impact that is a by-product of otherwise legitimate state acts, such as rent control, are not our focus or concern. At the other extreme, state laws organizing private cartels and state-granted monopoly rights blocking entry to essentially competitive markets are at the core of our concerns.