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Throughout the world, the rule against price fixing is competition law's most important and least controversial prohibition. Yet there is far less consensus than meets the eye on what constitutes price fixing, and prevalent understandings conflict with the teachings of oligopoly theory that supposedly underlie modern competition policy. Competition Policy and Price Fixing provides the needed analytical foundation. It offers a fresh, in-depth exploration of competition law's horizontal agreement requirement, presents a systematic analysis of how best to address the problem of coordinated oligopolistic price elevation, and compares the resulting direct approach to the orthodox prohibition. In doing so, Louis Kaplow elaborates the relevant benefits and costs of potential solutions, investigates how coordinated price elevation is best detected in light of the error costs associated with different types of proof, and examines appropriate sanctions. Existing literature devotes remarkably little attention to these key subjects and instead concerns itself with limiting penalties to certain sorts of interfirm communications. Challenging conventional wisdom, Kaplow shows how this circumscribed view is less well grounded in the statutes, principles, and precedents of competition law than is a more direct, functional proscription. More important, by comparison to the communications-based prohibition, he explains how the direct approach targets situations that involve both greater social harm and less risk of chilling desirable behavior--and is also easier to apply.

Price fixing. --- Antitrust law. --- Competition --- Anti-trust law --- Competition law --- Trusts, Industrial --- Commercial law --- Trade regulation --- Collusion on pricing --- Collusive pricing --- Fixing, Price --- Horizontal price fixing --- Price collusion --- Pricing --- Restraint of trade --- Government policy. --- Law and legislation --- Law --- Antitrust law --- Price fixing --- Government policy --- EU Article 101. --- European Union. --- Sherman Act Section 1. --- Supreme Court precedents. --- U.S. antitrust law. --- U.S. lower court. --- adjudication. --- agreement requirement. --- alternative rule. --- burden of proof. --- cheating. --- chilling effects. --- circumstantial evidence. --- classic cartels. --- communication-based prohibition. --- communications technology. --- communications-based prohibition. --- communications. --- competition law. --- competition policy. --- competition rules. --- consumer welfare. --- contrasting approaches. --- conventional prohibition. --- coordinated behavior. --- coordinated oligopoly pricing. --- coordinated price elevation. --- corporate strategy. --- decision-making framework. --- decision-theoretic approach. --- detection. --- deterrence benefits. --- deterrence. --- differentiated products. --- differentiation. --- direct approach. --- game theory. --- homogeneous goods. --- horizontal agreements. --- horizontal-restraints cases. --- indirect approach. --- industry conditions. --- injunctions. --- institutional issues. --- interdependence. --- interdependent coordination. --- interfirm communication. --- interfirm communications. --- internal evidence. --- investigation. --- language. --- liability assessment. --- liability. --- lower courts. --- market behavior. --- market conditions. --- market-based evidence. --- market-based techniques. --- modern competition policy. --- modern oligopoly theory. --- monetary sanctions. --- negative behavioral effects. --- nonprice coordination. --- nonprice terms. --- oligopolies. --- oligopolistic coordination. --- oligopolistic industries. --- oligopolistic price elevation. --- oligopoly behavior. --- oligopoly theory. --- orthodox prohibition. --- paradox of proof. --- polar-opposite cases. --- price coordination. --- price cutting. --- price elevation. --- price fixing. --- price-fixing cases. --- price-fixing prohibition. --- prior scholarship. --- pure interdependence. --- remedies. --- sanctions. --- social welfare consequences. --- social welfare. --- unilateral market power.