Date of Award

2020

Document Type

Masters Thesis

Degree Name

M.A.

Organizational Unit

College of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences, Economics

First Advisor

Yavuz Yașar

Second Advisor

Andrea L. Stanton

Third Advisor

Chiara Piovani

Fourth Advisor

Henning Schwardt

Keywords

Antitrust, Google, Information, Microsoft, Network effects, Technology

Abstract

The information technology industry is one of the most rapidly growing yet concentrated markets existing today. Big Tech monopolies and their increasingly anticompetitive behavior posits risks for competition, technological innovation and consumer welfare. This ranges from price discrimination, limiting consumer choices to the unethical use of data. The particular nature of information technology, with its network effects and negligible marginal costs, incentivizes and facilitates predatory market practices making antitrust analysis in this industry extremely complex. Certain schools of antitrust thought are more sensitive (namely the post-Chicago school) to these implications than others, though antitrust application is still lacking in both the European Union and the United States. This thesis thoroughly analyzed the landmark Microsoft and Google antitrust cases to find that it is imperative to increase antitrust oversight globally and identified the specific technological elements that antitrust bodies need to pay attention to in order to improve their antitrust applications in the information technology industry.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Shamayeta Rahman

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

145 p.

Discipline

Economics

Download



Share

COinS