Antitrust and The Rule of Law: A Conversation with Former FTC Chair Lina Khan
Why It Matters
Khan’s labor‑focused antitrust agenda redefines how businesses assess mergers and employment contracts, creating new compliance risks and strategic opportunities for firms while signaling a broader regulatory push toward market fairness.
Key Takeaways
- •FTC under Khan linked antitrust enforcement to worker welfare
- •Kroger‑Albertsons merger challenge included novel labor‑harm analysis in review
- •Non‑compete rule targeted low‑wage workers, faced mixed court rulings
- •Agency revived “unfair methods of competition” provision for gig workers
- •Khan emphasized coalition‑building across political lines to sustain reforms
Summary
The Harvard Law School conversation revisited former FTC Chair Lina Khan’s tenure, focusing on how she reshaped antitrust doctrine to address labor market concentration and broader societal harms. Khan explained that the agency began treating worker impacts as a core component of merger reviews, expanding the traditional consumer‑centric lens.
Key initiatives included the landmark Kroger‑Albertsons challenge, where the FTC filed a complaint that paired traditional price‑harm arguments with a detailed labor‑harm narrative, marking the first time courts evaluated worker consequences in a merger case. The FTC also pursued aggressive action against non‑compete agreements, securing injunctions that freed thousands of low‑wage employees, though the rule survived a patchwork of district‑court rulings. Additionally, the agency revived the “unfair methods of competition” provision to police deceptive practices in the gig economy, extending consumer‑protection tools to safeguard workers.
Khan highlighted the breadth of public engagement, noting over 25,000 comments supporting the non‑compete rule, even from unexpected quarters such as religious‑liberty advocates concerned about vaccine‑related employment coercion. She also described the agency’s internal dynamics, emphasizing how multi‑member deliberations and cross‑ideological coalitions strengthened the durability of its policies despite judicial hostility.
The discussion underscored a lasting shift: antitrust enforcement is now viewed as a lever for improving labor conditions and market fairness, setting precedents that future FTC chairs must navigate amid a potentially hostile Supreme Court and evolving administrative law landscape.
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