Biden Urges More Scrutiny of Big Businesses, Such as Tech Giants

But Mr. Biden may find it difficult to address the decline in competition across diverse parts of the economy — including Silicon Valley, Wall Street, chain restaurants and large hospital networks — solely through executive action. Experts warn that in many areas, the president will need to work with Congress to change federal laws if he hopes to have more success than former President Donald J. Trump, who also issued competition-focused executive orders and who saw limited results from them.

Many of the agencies, such as the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission, mentioned in the Friday order are independent, meaning the White House can only encourage them, not direct them, to take specific steps. But in statements on Friday, those agencies largely embraced the proposals and promised to take action.

In interviews this week, senior administration officials acknowledged the limitations of executive authority but said the order focused on actions, like directing federal regulators to take steps to boost competition, that had the best chance of success in driving change across the economy.

The order includes 72 provisions stretching across disparate sectors of the economy. One part of the order tells the federal agencies that approve mergers that they should update their guidance for vetting deals to better capture technology companies’ business models. Another asks the Federal Communications Commission to reinstate so-called net neutrality rules for broadband providers. Yet another asks the Federal Trade Commission to stop manufacturers from blocking farmers from repairing their tractors on their own.

Other parts target health care at several levels. The order supports states and tribal governments that allow the importing of lower-cost prescription drugs from Canada, pushes to allow hearing aids to be sold over the counter and asks the F.T.C. and the Justice Department to more stringently scrutinize hospital mergers to ensure that patients are not harmed by them.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/09/business/biden-big-business-executive-order.html