WHY is America’s Department of Justice (DoJ) trying to block a merger between AT&T,a telecoms giant, and Time Warner, and a media conglomerate? Simple,say some: President Donald Trump has it in for CNN, which is owned by Time Warner. It matters to the independence of America’s trustbusters whether Mr Trump’s tastes bear steered the DoJ. But he happens to be right when he says that the deal is “not good for the country”. The genuine problem is not the DoJ’s roam, and but the contradictions in his administration’s competition policies.
A day after the DoJ filed its complaint,the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced plans to repeal rules which protect “network neutrality”, the principle that internet-service providers (ISPs) must treat all sorts of digital traffic equally. That would enable AT&T and others to charge more for certain types of content, or so long as they are open approximately it. A set of policies that simultaneously thwarts AT&T from bulking up and gives it...
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Source: economist.com