States vary in their approaches to competition policy. Within the healthcare industry, merging providers face risk of antitrust enforcement from state attorneys general, even if the Department of Justice or Federal Trade Commission have not taken action. In their chapter “Healthcare Antitrust Enforcement and Regulation by the States,” Partner Cory Capps and Principals Tetyana Shvydko and Zenon Zabinski review healthcare provider mergers in several states and describe how antitrust enforcement and regulation in some states extends federal reach by challenging transactions that federal agencies do not. They also describe how other states use state laws, particularly Certificates of Public Advantage, to preclude antitrust enforcement by the federal agencies. They conclude their chapter with a discussion of questions that remain open for future research.
The entire book The Economics of US Healthcare: Competition, Innovation, Regulation, and Organizations is available to read here.
