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The Judiciary Is Skeptical of FTC Power Grabs in Meta/Within Case
The FTC tried to stop a merger between Facebook’s parent company Meta and the virtual reality app developer Within Unlimited. A court recently ruled against…
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New CEI Paper on New Merger Guidelines
Any day now, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will release new merger guidelines. FTC Chair Lina Khan has not yet released a draft of the…
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Regulatory Reform Bills in the 118th Congress: The Less Is More Resolution
Often, spending is regulation in disguise. The 185,000-page Code of Federal Regulations is not the only way Washington regulates the economy. The federal government…
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Regulatory Reform Bills in the 118th Congress: The GOOD Act
Regulatory dark matter is a serious problem. Agencies are supposed to run new regulations through a formal process which includes publishing a draft version of…
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Mixed Inflation News for January
Today’s inflation news is mixed. We’re still almost certainly past the worst of the COVID inflation, but January’s numbers took a turn for the…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
An earthquake killed at least 20,000 people in Turkey. President Biden delivered the State of the Union speech. Meanwhile, agencies issued new regulations ranging from…
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Regulatory Reform Bills in the 118th Congress: The REINS Act
Every new session of Congress is a new chance to enact substantive regulatory reform. This post inaugurates an occasional series highlighting reform bills that have…
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State of the Union and Inflation
Presidents, like quarterbacks, get too much blame when things go badly, and too much when things go well. Look for President Biden to take advantage…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) had a setback in one of its cases against Meta. The Fed raised interest rates. Meanwhile, agencies…
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FTC Should Not Trade Consumer Welfare for an Antitrust Crystal Ball
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The Department of Justice filed another antitrust lawsuit against Google. GDP numbers for the final quarter of 2022 looked healthy. Meanwhile, agencies issued new regulations…
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Adam Smith, Greek Tragedy, and Public Policy
In high school civics classes, Adam Smith is a cartoon character. Like Mr. Burns from The Simpsons, he is portrayed as selfish, cold, and calculating.
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The U.S. government hit its debt ceiling, setting up some congressional drama. Microsoft and Google joined the parade of antitrust targets announcing layoffs despite…
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The Debt Ceiling and the Trillion-Dollar Coin
Another debt ceiling battle is brewing, and pundits are debating what to do about it. Over at National Review’ Capital Matters, I take a look…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Inflation fell to a 6.5 percent annual pace. Supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro staged their own version of January 6. An…
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Federal Reserve Declines to Become Climate Regulator
Most agencies can either do one thing well or many things poorly. For example, the Federal Reserve would be perfectly capable of keeping inflation low…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The new Congress began with a lot of drama over selecting a speaker. The Federal Trade Commission announced its intention to ban non-compete clauses.
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations – Year-End 2022
Happy new year, everyone. Year-end totals for 2022’s new regulations are in. The 2022 Federal Register weighs in at 80,756 pages. It includes 3,168 final…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
A massive snowstorm with heavy winds hit most of the U.S. just in time for Christmas. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy traveled to Washington and addressed…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
CEI released its latest Agenda for Congress. Inflation slowed down in November, though there is still a ways to go before it’s…
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Agenda for Congress: Inflation
CEI’s Agenda for Congress is out now. This post summarizes its recommendations for inflation. Since inflation is mostly a monetary phenomenon, it is…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
A former president called for terminating the U.S. Constitution. Socialism failed again, this time in Peru. Congress passed a bill to protect…
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Gas Prices Are Lower than a Year Ago: What Does that Mean for Inflation?
Even with inflation near 40-year highs, gas prices are lower than a year ago, and not just in real, inflation-adjusted terms. They’re lower even…
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Regulatory Reform in Mississippi
Washington isn’t the only place that needs regulatory reform. States have their own excesses to deal with. To that end, our friends at the Mississippi…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The World Cup is underway in Qatar and the labor market had another good month. Meanwhile, agencies issued new regulations ranging from canola oil jet…
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Retro Review: George Selgin, Less Than Zero: The Case for a Falling Price Level in a Growing Economy (Institute of Economic Affairs, 1997)
This year, inflation reached levels not seen in 40 years. The Federal Reserve spent most of 2022 trying to undo its runaway money creation in…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
We hope everyone enjoyed Thanksgiving and/or Black Friday. Meanwhile, agencies issued new regulations ranging from nuclear drug tests to food tracing. On to the data:…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The 2022 Federal Register surpassed 70,000 pages on Friday, and is on pace for 79,617 pages. The first Artemis moon mission rocket launched. The…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The midterm elections happened, and most of us (sorry, Georgia) are finally free of misleading, scaremongering political ads. Inflation slowed down slightly. Meanwhile,…
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October Inflation Slightly Improves: Time for Less Politics and More Policy
Thank goodness the election is over. One of the frustrating parts of midterm season was that many people were more interested in how inflation would…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate again, though it remains less than the rate of inflation. Employment increased by 261,000 in…
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Federal Reserve Raises Interest Rate; Uncertainty Strengthens Case for a Policy Rule
As expected, the Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate by 0.75 percentage points coming out of this week’s Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC)…
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Retro Review: Jared Diamond—Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies (Norton, 1997)
In 1972, Jared Diamond was researching bird evolution in New Guinea. While walking along a beach, he had an hour-long conversation with a local politician…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Happy Halloween! CEI released the latest edition of Wayne Crews’s Ten Thousand Commandments report, which gives a big-picture overview of the federal regulatory state.
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New Whole-of-Government Initiative on Junk Fees Comes with Unintended Consequences
Today the Biden administration announced a new whole-of-government initiative on junk fees from airlines and other industries. The news comes on the same day…
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Ten Thousand Commandments 2022 Released
The 2022 edition of Wayne Crews’s Ten Thousand Commandments report is out now. Now in its 28th year, it has its usual panoply of…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Just two more weeks until the relentless barrage of misleading election ads goes away. The Energy Information Administration warned that heating bills could get…
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Policy and Politics Are Different Things
What is more important this election: The culture wars or policy issues like inflation? In an op-ed as part of a point-counterpoint series from…
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Not a Policy Paper, Just a Thought: Anti-Merger Mania
What is the correct number of corporate mergers that should be allowed? The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) thinks it knows the answer: less. It has…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Inflation took a turn for the worse and the January 6 Committee voted to subpoena former President Trump over his role in the…
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CPI Rises 0.4 Percent in September, 8.2 Percent over Past Year
September’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation numbers came out this morning, and they aren’t pretty. The month-to-month increase was 0.4 percent, after rising just…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Aaron Judge finished the baseball season with 62 home runs, setting a new American League season record. President Biden pardoned the sentences of all…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
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Troubling Inflation News: Core PCE Increases 0.6 Percent
The Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation indicator, Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE), was updated this morning with August’s numbers. PCE measures inflation more accurately than the…
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The Jones Act vs. Puerto Rico, Again
Puerto Rico is almost entirely without power after Hurricane Fiona. Right now, there is a ship just offshore, ready to help. It has…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate by 75 basis points, with more increases likely to come. Meanwhile, agencies issued new regulations ranging…
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Fed Raises Federal Funds Rate
As expected, the Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate by 75 basis points as part of its inflation-fighting efforts. Its target range will…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
CEI hosted its annual Julian Simon dinner on Thursday. The Consumer Price Index gave a mixed picture of inflation. A railroad strike was…
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FTC Hearing on Vaping Case Shows Antitrust at its Worst
Earlier this week, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) held a public hearing about a seemingly resolved antitrust case about the vaping market. In 2018,…
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Virtual Reality and the Relevant Market Fallacy
The relevant market fallacy is one of the most common analytical mistakes in antitrust policy. One of the first legal questions in an antitrust…
