Wednesday, May 18, 2011

100 Years of Myths about Standard Oil - Gary Galles - Mises Daily

100 Years of Myths about Standard Oil - Gary Galles - Mises Daily: "predatory pricing costs the supposed predator far more than it costs the prey, who can further expand the cost difference by temporarily shutting down. Unless the predator is allowed to buy up a victim driven to bankruptcy, others can buy up those assets cheaply, thus allowing them to again compete with the predator and reenter effective competition. Without the ability to prevent entry once monopoly pricing is attempted, the monopoly payoff disappears. Because it requires monopoly power to finance predation, predation cannot be the source of monopoly power"

"There has never been a single clear-cut example of a monopoly created by so-called predatory pricing… claims of predatory pricing are typically made by competitors who are either unwilling or unable to cut their own prices. Thus, legal restrictions on price cutting, in the name of combating 'predation,' are inevitably protectionist and anti-consumer…"

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