Why we shouldn’t abandon the consumer welfare standard

This year marks the 75th anniversary of one of the most destructive legal decisions in American law: US v. Alcoa, which declared it illegal for businesses to outcompete their rivals. Fortunately, in the 1970s, the legal community realized the errors of its ways and adopted a new rule, the “consumer welfare standard,” instead. The result was an explosion of economic growth. But today, activists are trying to eliminate that rule and move backwards to the days of the Alcoa case. I explain in today’s Dispatch.