Chillin'Competition

Yesterday was a public holiday in Brussels and I took part of the day to watch Inside Job, the Oscard winning documentary which attempts to trace back the origins of the financial crisis. The documentary is certainly controversial, but I believe worth watching. It is a strong critique of the deregulatory policies that had prevailed in the US since the years of the Reagan admministration. For our purposes, it suffices to realize that the rationale underlying those policies is exactly the same as the one driving those who advocate loosening or even repealing antitrust enforcement. In fact, Alan Greenspan, who is blamed in Inside Job as one of the individuals responsible for these policies, authored some years ago an article on antitrust law. Many of his views on economic policy have recently been proven wrong; could the same be said of his ideas on antitrust? I would say the answer is quite obvious. For all its initial incoherences and its current flaws, antitrust enforcement is as indispensable as financial regulation; hopefully we won’t have to learn this the hard way.

In any case, if you can, I very much recommend taking some time off to watch this movie and to read Greenspan’s very brief piece so that you can arrive to your ouwn conclusions.