Oct
09
2009

Workshop: Economic Issues in Broadband Competition

10:00 am - 12:00 pm EDT
Washington, DC

Consumer and firm demand for broadband and provider supply of broadband services are both influenced by the extent of competition among broadband providers. Competition can deliver low prices and high quality services to buyers, and influence the scope and timing of provider investments and innovation.

 
This workshop will explore the extent to which broadband providers currently exercise market power today, the prospects for new competition, strategies the FCC and other governmental actors can employ to foster competition and entry, and regulatory strategies that might help prevent harms to social welfare in markets not likely to become competitive soon.
 

Webcast

Topics

The following are some of the preliminary topics that will be covered at this workshop. If you would like to discuss any other topics, please send us your suggestions.
  • Do broadband providers currently exercise market power? How does the answer vary by type of customer and geographic region?
  • What are the prospects for new broadband competition from wireless and electricity providers?
  • Are any other types of entry on the horizon?What strategies should the FCC and other governmental actors employ to foster broadband competition and entry?
  • What regulatory strategies would protect competition and consumers in broadband markets not performing competitively? What conduct by broadband monopolists or duopolists would be particularly troublesome? Can that conduct be prohibited at low cost in production efficiency, and without discouraging investment and innovation or distorting competition in unregulated markets?

Agenda

10:00 am Workshop Introduction, Jonathan Baker, Chief Economist, Federal Communications Commission (on leave from Washington College of Law, American University) Moderator
 
10:05 am
Panel Presentations: 
  • Judith A. Chevalier, William S. Beinecke Professor of Finance and Economics, Yale School of Management
  • Joseph Farrell, Director, Bureau of Economics, Federal Trade Commission (on leave from Department of Economics, UC-Berkeley)
  • Shane Greenstein, Elinor and Wendell Hobbs Professor of Management and Strategy at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
  • Marius Schwartz, Professor of Economics, Georgetown University
  • Carl Shapiro, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics at the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (on leave from positions as Transamerica Professor of Business Strategy at the Haas School of Business, and Professor of Economics in the Economics Department)
11:20 am Panelist Discussion and Responses to Questions
  • FCC Participants: Colin Crowell, Senior Counselor to the Chairman; Julius Knapp, Chief, Office of Engineering; John Leibovitz, Deputy Chief, Wireless Bureau; Dr. Jon Peha, Chief Technologist 
11:55 am Closing Statements, Moderator
 
12:00 Noon Adjournment
 

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