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Lunch Discussion: Antitrust, Big Tech, and the Public Interest
April 21, 2022 @ 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
Would smaller, less powerful technology companies better serve the public interest? Many advocates have questioned the influence that large technology companies wield over everything from retail markets and consumer data to public expression and election integrity.
But some technology-related services widely believed to serve the public interest involve significant fixed costs that may be difficult for smaller companies to provide. Robust content moderation, data security, and near-100% uptime are all feasible for companies with billions of dollars in revenue and vast teams with technical expertise, but may present challenges for smaller companies, such as those that would result from requiring the breakup of modern tech giants like Google, Amazon, and Meta.
Do the benefits of breaking up large companies outweigh the potential costs? Are there less costly alternatives that would deliver similar public benefits? How might antitrust law and enforcement need to change to deliver the right balance?
Please join HLS Effective Altruism for lunch to discuss these questions and other issues related to tech and antitrust enforcement.
For background on the antitrust problem in the context of large technology companies and analysis of two potential strategies for addressing the problem within the antitrust framework, see Lina M. Khan, Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox, 126 Yale L. J. 710 (2017), https://www.yalelawjournal.org/note/amazons-antitrust-paradox.
For one proposal for reform outside the traditional antitrust framework, see Tom Wheeler, Phil Verveer, and Gene Kimmelman, New Digital Realities; New Oversight Solutions in the U.S., Harvard Kennedy School Shorenstein Center Discussion Paper (2020), https://shorensteincenter.org/new-digital-realities-tom-wheeler-phil-verveer-gene-kimmelman/.
Finally, for a perspective on one potential implication of more aggressive competition policy, see Shin-Shin Hua & Haydn Belfield, AI & Antitrust: Reconciling Tensions Between Competition Law and Cooperative AI Development, 23 Yale J.L. & Tech. 415 (2021), https://yjolt.org/ai-antitrust-reconciling-tensions-between-competition-law-and-cooperative-ai-development.
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