David Balto

Six months ago in Can the FTC Be a Fair Umpire? I wrote about the concerns arising from the Federal Trade Commission’s dual role as prosecutor and final decision maker in its administrative…

Anyone familiar with the antitrust newstream realizes there is a tremendous amount of controversy about the Federal Trade Commission’s administrative litigation process. Unlike the Antitrust Division…

In anticipation of a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing next week, entitled "The FTC at 100: Where Do We Go from Here," David Balto offers this post, discussing the important role Section 5…

Protecting data security is the most important consumer protection issue for the economy. Each year the Federal Trade Commission receives a flood of identity fraud complaints. Efforts to diminish the…

Charles Dickens’ famous novel A Tale of Two Cities begins with "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Dickens’ brilliant prose could have been describing our twin antitrust…

The authors are David Balto, an antitrust attorney in Washington, D.C., who was formerly a policy director of the Federal Trade Commission, attorney-adviser to Chairman Robert Pitofsky, and trial…

Nearly 100 year ago, Congress established the Federal Trade Commission to protect consumers against unfair, deceptive and anticompetitive practices.  Part of the reason for its creation was to create…

Commissioner Edith Ramirez became the new Chairwoman of the Federal Trade Commission on March 4. The White House announced the selection on February 28th. Chairwoman Ramirez is an excellent choice…

In Consolidation in Health Care Markets: A Review of the Literature, authors David Balto and James Kovacs in a study funded by and submitted to the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation discuss the recent…