Regulation

Chapter 7 considers a range of conditions that are usually considered as ‘market failures’ to be corrected by governmental regulation. I discuss these conditions, and possible responses to them, from a contractarian viewpoint. I argue that neoclassical arguments for regulations against cartels and against the exploitation of monopoly power can be endorsed on contractarian grounds, as can certain kinds of regulations against spurious complexity in pricing. I raise doubts about the significance of behavioural arguments for regulation that assume choice overload or preferences for self-constraint. I develop a concept of consumers’ surplus that does not depend on assumptions about preferences, and is defined in terms of the maximum yield of discriminatory pricing. I discuss two opportunity-enhancing mechanisms for the supply of public goods.