In the headline to a Dec. 7 press release, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that it, in concert with the U.S. Justice Department (DOJ) and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), had managed to “Lower Health Care and Drug Costs, Promote Competition to Benefit Patients, Health Care Workers.” According to the
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ICLE Files Amicus in NetChoice Social-Media Regulation Cases
By Ben Sperry
Through our excellent counsel at Yetter Coleman LLP, the International Center for Law & Economics (ICLE ) filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in the Moody v. NetChoice and NetChoice v. Paxton cases. In it, we argue that the First Amendment’s protection of the “marketplace of ideas” requires allowing private actors—like social-media…
Where Are the New FTC Rules?
By Alden Abbott
Perhaps more than at any time in its history, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) under Chair Lina Khan has highlighted substantive rulemaking as a central element of its policy agenda. But despite a great deal of rule-related sound and fury (signifying nothing?), new final rules have yet to emerge, and do not appear…
Has the Biden Administration Taken Over Broadband?
By Eric Fruits
Betteridge’s Law of Headlines states: “Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.” But, apparently, folks in the nation’s capital found a way around Betteridge’s Law.
This week, a U.S. House subcommittee hearing featured testimony from all five members of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The majority…
Google, Amazon, Switching Costs, and Red Herrings
Way back in May, I cracked wise about the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) fictional “Bureau of Let’s Sue Meta,” noting that the commission’s proposal (really, an “order to show cause”) to modify its 2020 settlement of a consumer-protection matter with what had then been Facebook—in other words, a settlement modifying a 2012 settlement—was…
A Brief History of the US Drug Approval Process, and the Birth of Accelerated Approval
By Roger Bate
This is the second post about the U.S. drug-approval process; the first post is here. It will explore how the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) arose, how disasters drove its expansion and regulatory oversight, and how the epidemic of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) changed the approval processes.
The Arrival of New Medicines…
Indiana Jones and the Allocation of Spectrum
By Eric Fruits
Hootenannies are mostly peaceful affairs, so it’s a bit awkward to invoke a violent metaphor here.
In “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” Indiana Jones runs down a Cairo sidestreet only to be confronted by a swordsman. The swordsman makes a big show of tossing his weapon from hand-to-hand and swirling it around. But Indy…
Making Sure New Medicines Are Safe, Effective, and Approved Quickly: A Theoretical Approach
By Roger Bate
This is the first in what will be a series of posts discussing how new medicines are introduced and regulated in the United States, and how the status quo could be improved. As will be established over the course of the series, the current system is slow and leads to poor outcomes for patients.
Why…
EU’s Cybersecurity Draft Shifts Toward Hard Protectionism
A year ago, we cautioned that the EU Cybersecurity Certification Scheme for Cloud Services (EUCS) threatened to embed ill-conceived economic protectionism into the EU’s cybersecurity rules. And, indeed, the European Commission, which has made clear its commitment to pursue “digital sovereignty” for the European Union, can claim some preliminary successes on that front.
A recent…
An Inconvenient Truth: Net Neutrality Depresses Broadband Investment
By Eric Fruits
It happens at just about every hootenanny. There’s always at least one song that clears the dance floor. Some tunes, people just won’t dance to. But with a little remixing and a better tempo, even a dirge can be danceable.
For years, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has refused to dance to the tune of…