by Kevin Coates | Sep 29, 2009 | General
At the 2009 Fordham Antitrust conference, there was a long session on EU and US approaches to the control of state aid (state subsidies), in the context of the financial and economic crisis. The EU has an extensive State aid control regime, which requires notification to the European Commission of any aid that may distort competition and that affects inter-state trade. One of the US panelists indicated that there was no mechanism under US law to enforce a similar control over state aid by US states, and nor could there be. I had understood that the US commerce clause (whereby Congress shall have power “to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;”) to be an equivalent of the EU principle that – in this case – the competition rules, including the State aid rules, apply where trade between Member States is affected. To determine whether a law violates this so-called “dormant” aspect of the Commerce Clause, we first ask whether it discriminates on its face against interstate commerce. American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Michigan Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 545 U.S. 429, 433 (2005); Fort Gratiot Sanitary Landfill, Inc. v. Michigan Dept. of Natural Resources, 504 U.S. 353(1992). In this context, ” ‘discrimination’ simply means differential treatment of in-state and out-of-state economic interests that benefits the former and burdens the latter.” Oregon Waste Systems, Inc. v. Department of Environmental Quality of Ore., 511 U.S. 93 (1994); New Energy Co. of Ind. v. Limbach, 486 U.S. 269(1988). United Haulers Association, Inc. v. Oneida-Herkimer Solid Waste Management Authority 127 S.Ct. 1786 (2007) This reference to...
by Kevin Coates | Jul 5, 2009 | General
This website will be – mostly – about technology and regulation: competition law – antitrust, merger control, State aid control – intellectual property law and sector regulation, in particular as these relate to information and communication markets, and in particular comparing EU and US approaches. I am an antitrust lawyer, and I have worked in this area for a while – in both public and private sectors. Now, I have just started a one year research fellowship at NYU School of Law comparing EU and US approaches. For the last couple of years I have been out of the sector, handling external communications for DG Competition (the part of the European Commission that handles competition enforcement – fining cartels, prohibiting anti-competitive mergers, vetting government aid to industry). High level presentation rather than low level detail. So when I decided to apply for a research fellowship I decided to get into the detail. I looked around at the main issues of the day – the collapse of the financial services system, the economic crisis in the real economy, the impending global disaster of climate change – and decided to research the regulation of technology markets. I decided to party like it’s...
by Kevin Coates | Jul 5, 2009 | General
This website will be – mostly – about technology and regulation: competition law – antitrust, merger control, State aid control – intellectual property law and sector regulation, in particular as these relate to information and communication markets, and in particular comparing EU and US approaches. I am an antitrust lawyer, and I have worked in this area for a while – in both public and private sectors. Now, I have just started a one year research fellowship at NYU School of Law comparing EU and US approaches. For the last couple of years I have been out of the sector, handling external communications for DG Competition (the part of the European Commission that handles competition enforcement – fining cartels, prohibiting anti-competitive mergers, vetting government aid to industry). High level presentation rather than low level detail. So when I decided to apply for a research fellowship I decided to get into the detail. I looked around at the main issues of the day – the collapse of the financial services system, the economic crisis in the real economy, the impending global disaster of climate change – and decided to research the regulation of technology markets. I decided to party like it’s...