Loading…

Graham Forgey on The battle between Big Beer and Craft Breweries

Graham Forgey

The battle between Big Beer and Craft Breweries

Claims and stances

Transcript

  1. 0:00 Hey, this is Graham Forge.
  2. 0:01 This is uh this is my topic today is antitrust and the battle between big beer and craft brewers.
  3. 0:06 I myself am a huge beer fan, so this interests me a lot.
  4. 0:08 There's a major political and economic struggle over market competition in the beer industry.
  5. 0:12 Federal and state regulators are increasingly concerned about the consolidation of power among large multinational brewers and distributors.
  6. 0:19 There's a squeeze on small breweries.
  7. 0:21 There's legacy regulations, many dating back to the post-prohibition era.
  8. 0:25 They've now seen as tools that large corporations use to disadvantage small independent breweries.
  9. 0:30 There's also government scrutiny.
  10. 0:31 The Biden administration singled out a tougher stance on antitrust issues across the economy, and the beer industry industry is no exception.
  11. 0:37 The Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission have revised their merger guidelines, giving them more leeway to challenge acquisitions that can stifle the smaller breweries competition.
  12. 0:46 This is a direct response to to concerns that a few big players control too much of the market, such as Anheuser Busch and Kors.
  13. 0:54 There's a key question though.
  14. 0:56 Are these depression-air alcohol laws still relevant, or do they now primarily serve to protect large established companies from new competition?
  15. 1:03 This is a classic debate about the role of government regulation in the capitalist economy.
  16. 1:08 Thank you.