Competition Policy at the Intersection of Equity and Efficiency

• Author: Eleanor M. Fox
• Published date: 01 March 2018
• Date: 01 March 2018
• DOI: 10.1177/0003603X18756130
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Competition Policy at the

Intersection of Equity and

Efficiency: The Developed and

Developing Worlds

Eleanor M. Fox*

Abstract

The author tells the tale of her journey to discover the synergy between equity and efficiency.

Keywords

antitrust, competition, equity, efficiency, economic development, developing countries

In the last quarter of the last century in matters of economic law, it was common cause that we could

pursue either efficiency or equity but not both; the twain would not meet. I never believed it.

The Gospel of Efficiency was ushered into U.S. antitrust by the Chicago School, whose beautiful

proofs,

1

dating at least from the 1960s,

2

were resisted by U.S. law and policy makers until the early

1980s. They gained traction with the presidential election of Ronald Reagan (1980), validating the

national sentiment that government had wormed its way too deeply into the business of business; that

business was essentially efficient, and that if we simply left business free to do the work of business,

we would all be better off. Pursuit of equity was regarded as wrongheaded. If we pursued equity, we

would undermine efficiency. The pie would shrink and we would all be worse off.

*New York University School of Law, New York, NY, USA

Corresponding Author:

Eleanor M. Fox, New York University School of Law, Vanderbilt Hall 306, 40 Washington Sq. South, New York, NY 10012, USA.

E-mail: eleanor.fox@nyu.edu

1. See Paul Krugman, How Did Economists Get it So Wrong? NEW YORK TIMES (Sep. 6, 2009), Magazine section, at 36: The

economists failed to see the financial crisis of 2008 coming because they so unquestionably trusted markets. “The economics

profession went astray because economists, as a group, mistook beauty, clad in impressive-looking mathematics, for truth.”

Id. at 37.

2. In this essay I do not make a distinction between efficiency, consumer welfare, or total welfare. The welfare standards are

aspects of efficiency. Efficiency is calculated as an outcome of a particular transaction or course of conduct. The analyst asks:

Does it or does it not lessen welfare? In large markets such as the United States, consumer welfare usually coincides with total

welfare. Indeed, in Robert Bork’s famous book, ROBERT BORK,THE ANTITRUST PARADOX (1978), Bork defines total welfare as

consumer welfare. See ch. 5.

The Antitrust Bulletin

2018, Vol. 63(1) 3-6

ªThe Author(s) 2018

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DOI: 10.1177/0003603X18756130

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