Indirect Purchaser Suits and Jurisdictional Competition
Global Competition Review, December 2013
10 Pages Posted: 24 Jan 2014 Last revised: 12 Mar 2014
Date Written: 2013
Abstract
This short commentary for the Global Competition Review looks at conflict-of-laws questions concerning the availability of “indirect purchaser” suits under state antitrust laws. Using “comparative impairment” analysis, recent decisions have drawn implausible distinctions between seemingly identical cases on the basis of suppositions about how strongly attached different states are to their respective laws. A better approach would be to mold conflict-of-laws rules to enhance parties’ jurisdictional choice. Comparative impairment was the brainchild of antitrust giant William Baxter, and it seems an appropriate context to consider the effect different conflicts rules will have on the “market for law.”
Keywords: conflict of laws, choice of law, antitrust, indirect purchaser suits, parens patriae; antitrust standing, comparative impairment, law market, Illinois Brick, horizontal federalism, jurisdictional competition
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