Continuing the recent blogospheric obsession with football and politics, I thought it worth calling your attention to some Supreme Court prognostication: It seems that the Nine aren't interested in granting the NFL its desire to be a monopoly. And thank goodness for that. Not only would it be a bummer for football fans, who would likely have to pay out the nose for the privilege of watching an increasingly mediocre sport, it would more importantly set a precedent that other businesses would be able to follow, combining into joint ventures to reap the benefits of both individual businesses and monpoly power at the expense of workers and consumers. It looks like recently appointed Justice Sonia Sotomayor is right out front on this one (she saved baseball from itself once, too):
The court considered a lawsuit challenging the NFL's decision to give a sole contract to Reebok to manufacture hats, T-shirts and other apparel bearing the logos of the league's teams. But the bigger question was whether the NFL should be considered a "single entity" -- rather than a collection of 32 independently owned teams -- and thus shielded from the Sherman Antitrust Act. A single company cannot be guilty of conspiring with itself to harm consumers.Justice Sonia Sotomayor told the NFL's attorney, Gregg Levy: "You are seeking through this ruling what you haven't gotten from Congress: an absolute bar to an antitrust claim."
Steve Pearlstein has written an excellent case against the NFL's claim, which began with a lawsuit by a small apparel company that objected to the NFL's decision to give a league-wide contract to Reebok, unfairly removing the firm's opportunity to compete for NFL business all while raising consumer prices in the process. Essentially, giving the NFL a complete anti-trust exemption removes any market discipline from the league, making it easier for failing teams to keep failing, prices to keep rising -- and taxpayers to keep funding stadiums.
For the final testimony against the NFL's proposal, New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees had a piece that we'll charitably assume he wrote himself in the Post last week -- think the paper's full-court press on this issue has anything to do with their laughably poor local team, the Redskins? -- that made the case from the player's point of view.
There's one other connection to be made here: Getting a public conversation moving on the issue of anti-trust law is one of the first steps towards dealing with other monopolies, like those in the financial sector. That topic may come up this morning as the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission questions Attorney General Eric Holder -- I'll be covering it live.
-- Tim Fernholz
