DOJ Will Monitor Impact of Cable Prices, Bundles on Consumers

The Department of Justice's new antitrust enforcer pledged to the Senate that monitoring merger deal conditions, cable pricing and bundles and allowing consumers to drop pay-TV service in favor of free online fare would all be major focuses for his division.

That came in an antitrust oversight hearing in the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee featuring William Baer, assistant attorney general in the DOJ antitrust division, and new Federal Trade Commission chairwoman Edith Ramirez. DOJ and FTC share antitrust oversight of mergers, along with the FCC for communications mergers that involve transfers of licenses. Sens. Al Franken (D-MN) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) focused in on communications issues. Sen Franken began his questioning of the witnesses by saying that consumers were having a hard time stretching the family budget to pay for $200 cable bills and $200 mobile phone bills. "These markets are very consolidated," he said.