Should-Read: Liz Hipple: Understanding the importance of antitrust policy for U.S. economic competitiveness and consumer choice: "John E. Kwoka... documents the rise in industry concentration and examines the evidence for one possible explanation... http://equitablegrowth.org/equitablog/value-added/understanding-the-importance-of-antitrust-policy-for-u-s-economic-competitiveness-and-consumer-choice/
...the change in merger enforcement policy at the Federal Trade Commission, or FTC, and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. Kwoka examines FTC enforcement data from the mid-1990s through 2011, finding that enforcement rates for mergers that would result in four or fewer significant competitors not only remained high but also increased marginally over that time. But for mergers where the number of remaining significant competitors was more than four, enforcement not only fell over the analyzed time period but also had literally ceased by 2007...
