When President Biden took office, he sent several signals that he was willing to increase the focus of the company. One of the most obvious is appointing consumer advocate Lina Khan – a prominent critic of monopoly power – to lead the Federal Trade Commission.
Instead, the takeover remains under Biden’s supervision. Last week presented the latest evidence that reducing the company’s concentration will be more difficult than Biden could have hoped for: US courts have rejected the FTC’s attempt to prevent Microsoft from acquiring video game company Activision Blizzard. Microsoft could finalize the deal in the coming months; an important deadline has been extended this week.
The merger will by far be the largest ever in video games, after adjusting for inflation. The game industry now makes up a significant portion of the economy. It’s bigger than music, US book publishing, and North American sports combined. Microsoft’s games division and Activision Blizzard each year make more money than all the movie theaters in the United States. These two companies are among the biggest in the gaming space, as this chart by my colleague Ashley Wu shows:
The FTC said the Microsoft-Activision merger was anticompetitive and sued to block it. The agency argued that the merger would give Microsoft, the maker of the Xbox console, an overwhelming advantage over rival Sony, the maker of the PlayStation. Of particular interest is Activision’s massive franchise, Call of Duty. The new version of Call of Duty is consistently one of the best-selling games on Xbox and PlayStation every year. But if Microsoft owns Call of Duty, it could make the game an Xbox exclusive and rob one of the game’s biggest draws to Sony.
To address those concerns, Microsoft has promised that it will bring Call of Duty games to PlayStation in 10 years time. That’s one reason the courts ruled against the FTC: They found the agency failed to demonstrate that the deal would likely harm competition.
With their ruling, the courts are allowing another major merger that will further solidify a major industry. Many experts say that trend is ultimately hurting consumers by reducing the form of competition that lowers prices and improves the quality of goods and services, even if the FTC can’t prove all of that in this case.
concentrated power
Let’s zoom out. Over the past few decades, the market has become more concentrated. The biggest companies dominate most industries, as this chart shows:
Why is this problem? Simply put, the lack of competition allows companies to reduce wages, raise prices, and degrade the quality of their products. A classic example is internet service: Many Americans live in places with only one or two providers. These companies keep prices high, the internet can be unstable, and customer service is often poor. Since customers have no alternatives, suppliers can eliminate those errors.
The corporate focus deepens that kind of problem, Experts say. One economist has concluded that market concentration costs the typical American household more than $5,000 a year. Radicals like Khan have argued that regulators need to take the issue more seriously.
Court pushed back
Biden administration release guide This week seeks to tighten antitrust laws to curb anticompetitive practices. Under Khan, the FTC has also pushed the courts to reduce the burden of proof needed to prove that a merger is anticompetitive. Some experts argue that such an approach has merit: US courts have raised the bar very high over the past few decades, surpassing those in the UK and much of Europe.
“We can convict someone and put him in jail for murder based on circumstantial evidence,” said Douglas Melamed, an expert on antitrust issues at Stanford Law School. “But it seems unlikely that the courts will let a plaintiff win an antitrust case based on circumstantial evidence.”
FTC Not yet to convince the courts to relax their standards. The agency damage in the Microsoft-Activision case is the latest example. It also failed to prevent Meta from acquiring a virtual reality company, Inside. And it even lost in its own administrative court, which ruled in favor of sequencing company Illumina in its acquisition of Grail.
Khan’s cause is still potent. The last major change in antitrust law, in the 1970s, came after decades of efforts by conservatives to push the law and courts in their direction. The movement that Khan helped popularize among radicals was only a few years old. If it convinces more of the public and, most importantly, the judges, it may eventually succeed.
Related: Failure of the FTC raised new questions about Khan’s strategy. “All these court losses are making their threats look more like a paper tiger,” said one executive.
International
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British Conservative Party lost two seats in a special parliamentary election, an ominous sign for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s political future.
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War has been more suffering of Ukrainian children with cancer.
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Under a jungle in Mexico, archaeologists use lasers Ruins discovered of a Mayan city.
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opinion
The burden of medical paperwork delaying care and make the patient sicker, doctor Chavi Karkowsky write.
above Podcast “A matter of opinion”Times writers share their summer book recommendation.
These are the columns according to Nicholas Kristof ABOVE sex trafficking And Gail Collins ABOVE Joe Manchin.
Morning Reading
Where are we: Arab-American youth find community in a hookah lounge in Dearborn, Mich.
“Am I training my replacement?”: Call center staff are facing AI’s threat to their jobs.
Modern love: The father lost his memory but has been recognised about the sex of your child.
Life lived: After being expelled from the US military in 1963 for being a lesbian, Lilli Vincenz soon became a gay rights advocate in the period before the Stonewall riots. She passed away at the age of 85.
WOMEN’S WORLD CUP
Older players used to rely on MapQuest prints. A younger person has never used a CD player. American team there is a generation gap to overcome as it opens tonight’s game against Vietnam.
Vietnamese women are representing a football-obsessed country in its first World Cup.
The United States will take home more money than any other team, no matter how it endsbecause of a labor agreement with the United States Soccer Federation.
After losing star player Sam Kerr to injury, Australia beat Ireland, 1-0. Canada, a leading contender, played against Nigeria in a goalless draw. And Spain beat Costa Rica, 3-0.
OTHER SPORTS NEWS
Change owner: NFL team owner Sales approval of Washington Commanders and fined outgoing owner, Daniel Snyder, $60 million after an investigation found that he harassed a former cheerleader. It was the largest penalty ever imposed on an NFL team owner.
NFL Coach Stepping Out: Kevin Maxen, an associate coach for the Jacksonville Jaguars, is said to be openly gay for the first time Men’s coaches in major American men’s professional sports.
ARTS AND IDEAS
Translating between cultures: Japanese comics, called manga, are very popular in America But translating them for a western audience is difficult, wrote Gabriel Gianordoli and Robert Ito. In Japan, books are read from right to left. And the pages are often filled with sounds – there are thousands of onomatopoeias in Japanese, far more than the word “pow!” normally. of American comics.
More about culture
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fans say John Mayer’s facial expression when he plays guitar is as passionate as his music.
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With a six-figure face and vulgar text messages, the character Bitsy von Muffling in “And Just Like That…” evoke Samantha Jones of the original “Sex and the City.”
MORNING RECOMMENDATION…
