Author: Stacy Mitchell Published: 11/17/2022 ILSR
- A Renewable Rural America: “The climate movement, by and large, has overlooked rural America,” argues Josh Ewing, director of the Rural Climate Partnership. Yet America’s rural economies are expected to be the hardest hit by climate change. In a recent episode of the Building Local Power podcast, Ewing explains why renewable energy is such a winning economic proposition for rural America, and shares how he’s fighting the monopoly-funded misinformation campaigns that stand in its way. Listen to the podcast.
- In LA, Poorer Neighborhoods are Being Charged Higher Prices for Slower Internet: Digital Equity LA, a coalition of more than 40 community-based organizations, has released a new study that lays bare how LA’s low-income communities of color are impacted by the quiet business decisions of the region’s monopoly Internet service provider. Charter Spectrum “shows a clear and consistent pattern of the provider reserving its best offers—high speed at low cost—for the wealthiest neighborhoods in LA County,” the study’s authors write. Read more.
- How Tax Policies Fuel Monopolies and Undermine Small Business: In a special issue of Tax Justice Focus, ILSR’s Stacy Mitchell and Susan Holmerg argue that most of the giant corporations that now dominate their industries owe their market power in part to government handouts and tax favors. For decades, local and federal U.S. policymakers have systematically structured the tax system to fuel the concentration of corporate power at the expense of everyone else, including small businesses. Amazon’s strategy for dominance, in particular, offers a road map of how to harness the tax system to build a monopoly. Read the article.
TOP FEATURE
The Beginning of the End of the So-Called “Consumer Welfare” Standard: On November 1, a federal judge sided with the Department of Justice to block the proposed merger between Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster, two of the industry’s largest publishers. The decision, which ruled that the deal would illegally stifle competition for book contracts, is “a major milestone on the path to recovering antitrust’s broad purpose,” said ILSR co-director Stacy Mitchell in a statement. For decades, the DOJ has pursued antitrust cases almost exclusively on the basis of consumer harm (i.e., prices). This narrow focus “has warped and enfeebled antitrust enforcement for the last 40 years,” Mitchell continued. Ironically, there’s also evidence that it’s hurt consumers. “This ruling makes clear that concentration’s harm to creators, producers, and workers is a crucial concern of antitrust law. It also raises serious questions about whether Amazon’s monopoly power over the book industry will be allowed to stand. Amazon, after all, is an even more dominant gatekeeper in the book industry than these two publishers combined.” See the full statement here.
BUILDING LOCAL POWER
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