The Utah Statement: Reviving Antimonopoly Traditions for the Era of Big Tech

A new framework for holding private power to account

Credit: Tayler Smith

Over the last several years, a movement to revive the anti-monopoly traditions of the United States has gained increasing momentum and even retaken its place in presidential political debate. While popularly known as a movement to “break up big tech,” it is really a movement that reacts to the economic policies of the last 40 years. For we have, over that time, weakened and nearly abandoned the anti-monopoly tradition that, in various forms, has been part of the U.S. system since the Declaration of Independence and the original anti-monopoly tea-party protest. The result has been decades of economic consolidation across industries like agriculture, finance, pharmaceuticals, and telecommunications. It is a reaction also to the consolidation of tech into just a few platforms, like Google, Facebook, and Amazon.

We have been left with an economy dominated by well-protected oligopolies who maintain high profits, low levels of investment, and stagnant wages. Employers have gained disproportionate power over their workers, thanks to a weakening of labor law, declining unionization, and business models that coerce and restrict workers. The policies have also contributed to the widening gap between rich and poor…