The remedies proposed by the Department of Justice (DOJ) for the Google antitrust case, released on November 19, are a stunning example of prosecutorial overreach. DOJ antitrust chief Jonathan Kanter and his team went far beyond Judge Mehta’s findings, proposing to break up one of America’s most successful, innovative, and consumer-friendly companies.
Indeed, the DOJ’s proposed remedies serve as an ironic post-election punctuation mark, emphasizing how the Biden Administration poured vast amounts of resources and attention into a case against Google that working Americans simply didn’t care about. Voters rightfully complained about the high price of food and homes, and voted that way. Tech firms were not on their list of major policy concerns, especially since tech was a low-inflation sector of the economy.
Moreover, PPI’s analysis shows that rather than Google suppressing growth, the tech sector has been a powerful source of jobs during the pandemic and after. Since 2019, domestic tech employment has risen by some 700,000 workers, spread around the country, including significant job gains in states such as Colorado, Arizona, Pennsylvania, and Florida.
Antitrust policy is not a popularity contest, of course. But if there’s one thing that the election teaches us, it’s that government actions have to serve the needs of ordinary consumers. And by that measuring stick, many of the proposed remedies from the DOJ fail miserably.
For example, the DOJ would force Google to provide vast amounts of user and search data at a minimal cost to “rivals and potential rivals” — that is, anybody who asked — creating inevitable data security and privacy nightmares. No sane consumer would support a “remedy” that increases the exposure of their data.
The DOJ would also require Google to divest Chrome and hobble Android in ways that would make these popular products less useful to consumers. These changes would be a disaster for ordinary users.
DOJ’s ambitious and expansive remedy proposals serve as an illustration of how the Biden Administration missed the boat politically and economically.
