Senator Elizabeth Warren Delivers Remarks on Reigniting Competition in the American Economy
Full text of the speech available here (PDF)
Washington, DC - Today, United States Senator Elizabeth Warren delivered remarks highlighting the need for stronger action to encourage competition in markets and to strengthen our economy.
"Today, in America, competition is dying," Senator Warren said. "Consolidation and concentration are on the rise in sector after sector. Concentration threatens our markets, threatens our economy, and threatens our democracy."
Noting examples of significant concentration in various industries, the senator identified five specific consequences of this trend: less consumer choice, barriers to industry entry for smaller and newer companies, the collapse of small businesses, concentrated political power for large corporations, and a declining middle class.
The senator detailed the antitrust efforts of the Progressive Era in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that helped combat concentrated economic and political power and encourage market competition, but that ultimately gave way to a deregulatory approach beginning in the 1970s and 1980s. She then laid out several steps the President and Executive Branch can take to enforce our antitrust laws: hold the line on anticompetitive mergers, closely scrutinize vertical mergers, and require all agencies to promote market competition and promote agency heads who will do so.
"Strong Executive leadership could revive antitrust enforcement in this country and begin, once again, to fight back against dominant market power and overwhelming political power," said Senator Warren. "Competition in America is essential to liberty in America, but the markets that have given us so much will become corrupt and die if we do not keep the spirit of competition strong."
A PDF copy of the full speech is available here.
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