A Proposal to Enhance Antitrust Protection Against Labor Market Monopsony
January 10, 2019
By Ioana Marinescu, Eric A. Posner
The United States has a labor monopsony problem. Though legal tools are already in place to combat monopsony, they have only been used against the most obvious forms of anticompetitive conduct like no-poaching agreements. More generally, there has been virtually no enforcement against abuses of monopsony power in labor markets.
In a Roosevelt Institute working paper, University of Pennsylvania professor Ioana Marinescu and University of Chicago professor Eric A. Posner propose draft legislation that would strengthen the law, so that workers, antitrust agencies, and attorneys general can more easily bring lawsuits against labor monopsonists. With wage stagnation a significant problem in today’s economy and workers increasingly powerless, Congress should take action with competition-friendly policies that promise to increase wages.