Antitrust Summary and Analysis

This chapter on antitrust is written by Alan Greenspan. He describes the business world with antitrust as a world that lauds competition, yet if there is too much competition then it is deemed to be cutthroat. Greenspan says they should review the entire antitrust system. To understand why, he says, one must look at the history of the antitrust laws on the economic principles on which they are based. The popular belief was if businesses were left free to do as they wanted, the result would be arbitrary power.

When the railroads were being constructed, they were needed for development so they were subsidized in the form of land grants. Lands grants were based on the fact that there could be no other competing railroads in the area. The result was there was a lot of sub-standard construction done for the...