What Competition Is, And What It Is Not
Competition is a buzzword. Everyone loves it, but there are vastly different interpretations of this precious concept. These different interpretations lead to strongly conflicting policy recommendations. Imagine you and your super wealthy friend bet on who will win the 100 metres at the Olympics. Your friend wins the bet. But then you find out that […]
Political Competition: Real Race to the Bottom
The current presidential election in Turkey gives an example of a phenomenon that is characteristic of politics and which is not absent from the American scene: unrestrained political competition is the ne plus ultra of the proverbial race to the bottom. As the main opposition candidate tries to defeat India’s populist strongman Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, […]
Friedrich Hayek on Industrial Organization, Competition, and Monopoly
One of the treats of the recent Liberty Fund colloquium on the Austrian and Chicago schools of thought was getting to read or reread various excerpts from Friedrich Hayek’s work. In a chapter titled “Government Policy and the Market” from his 1982 book Law, Legislation, and Liberty, Volume 3, Hayek nicely puts perfect competition in […]