Cowen on neutrality, plus event this Thursday

Today, Tyler Cowen posted some cautious, but surprising words about his stance on the net regulation issue:

I favor net neutrality in the current environment. Without neutrality, Comcast and Verizon would use differential pricing schemes to extract more revenue and thus diminish some forms of Net output, including Google, Amazon, ebay, and possibly blogs. … If the cable and telecom companies had no legally-backed monopoly powers, I would not favor legally enforced net neutrality. “Let the market decide” would be a good answer.

You should read his whole post for more of his argument. But I wonder: If a lack of competition is caused by a government-backed monopoly power, as Cowen suggests, wouldn’t removing the regulations that create that power be the preferred course of action? Shouldn’t adding a new layer of “legally enforced net neutrality” regulation be our last, hopeless recourse? And aren’t we headed in a generally pro-competitive direction? Even putting aside the tremendous growth in competition over the past 25 years, don’t steps like the COPE Act’s streamlining of franchising help to continue to eliminate the very government-imposed barriers to entry that create market power?

I don’t know the answers to these questions, and that’s why I will remain “neutral” and simply moderate a panel discussion on neutrality regulation this Thursday, June 15, hosted by America’s Future Foundation. TLF’s own James Gattuso will be joined by Patrick Ross of PFF on the anti-regulation side, while Alex Curtis of Public Knowledge and Frannie Ross of Free Press will take the pro-neutrality side. The event will take place on the Hill with drinks beginning at 6:30 and discussion at 7. I hope you can join us! More information here.

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