In reading the Europeans’ latest bogus antitrust assault against Google, we couldn’t help notice that according to the lawsuit, Google has violated their Digital Markets Act because “the cost per click for advertising has risen faster than the rate of inflation in Europe.”  The Eurocrats complain that Google’ business plan is meant to squash the EU competitors and is causing them “severe financial hardship.”

Apparently, “from 2018 to 2020, the average cost per click inflation for these companies

was roughly 19-21 percent.”

Google has dismissed the complaint as “baseless” and says it is “weaponizing the DMA to protect a small set of vested interests at the expense of European consumers and businesses.” I.E., Google’s far inferior European tech competitors.

This absurd complaint reminds us of the old Thomas Sowell line that if a company’s prices rise faster than the average, it is a monopolist; if its prices rise slower than its competitors, it’s guilty of predatory pricing; and if the prices rise at exactly the same pace as competitors, the company is guilty of price fixing and colluding with the competition.

You can’t win with these people.

One more point, if prices rising faster than inflation is prima facie evidence of monopoly, then every university president, health insurance executive, and the Postmaster General should be in jail.