CONGRESSIONAL RECORD: Nov. 8, 1999
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Opening Page
GOOD TIME FOR CONGRESS TO REASSESS ANTITRUST LAWS ------------
HON. RON PAUL
OF TEXAS[Page: H11683]
Mr. Speaker, by now, the Microsoft antitrust case should have caught every Member's attention. This is a good time for Congress to reassess the antitrust laws.
Under current law, collusion, negotiations, or even discussions about markets may be enough to find someone guilty of breaking these laws. Prices in one industry that are too high, too low, or all the same are suspect and could be used as evidence of monopoly practices.
We must remember bigness in a free market is only achieved by the vote of consumers, supporting a company that gives them a good product at a low price.
It is an economic truism that the only true monopoly is government protected, such as the Post Office or a public utility. There is nothing more annoying than a government bureaucrat or Federal judge gleefully condemning a productive enterprising capitalist for doing a good job. These little men filled with envy are capable of producing nothing and are motivated by their own inadequacies and desires to wield authority against men of talent.
In a free market, the consumer is king, not the businessman. The regulators hate both and relish their role of making sure the market is fair according to their biased standards.
Antitrust suits are rarely, if ever, pursued by consumers. It is always a little disgruntled competitor, a bureaucrat who needs to justify his own existence.
Judge Jackson condemned Microsoft for being a `vigorous protector of its own self-interests.' Now this is to be a crime in America. To care for oneself and do what corporations are supposed to do, that is, maximize profits for stockholders by making customers happy, is the great crime committed in the Microsoft case.
Blind to the fact that there is no conflict between the self-interest of a capitalist and the consumers' best interests, the trust busters go their merry way without a complaint from the Congress which could change these laws.
Only blind resentment drives the economic planners and condemns business success, good products, low prices, and consumer satisfaction while undermining the system that has provided so much for so many.
Many big companies have achieved success with government subsidies, contracts, and special interest legislation. This type of bigness must be distinguished from bigness achieved in a free market by providing consumer satisfaction.
To help rectify the situation, Congress should first stop all assistance to business, no more corporate welfare, no bailouts like we saw to Lockheed, Chrysler, Long-Term Capital Management and many others.
Second, we ought to repeal the archaic and impossible-to-understand antitrust laws.
Next, we should crown the consumers king and let them vote with their money on who should succeed and who should fail.
We should then suppress the envy which drives the anticapitalist mentality.
The Bill Gateses of the world can only invest their money in job-creating projects or donate it to help the needy. The entrepreneurial giants are not a threat to stability or prosperity. Government bureaucrats and Federal judges are. But strict enforcement of all the ill-inspired antitrust laws does not serve the consumer, nor the cause of liberty.