ANALYSIS: How Much Prison Time for a Monopoly? Not Much.

Federal courts have this year sentenced two people for monopolization offenses charged during the Biden Administration. While the Justice Department hasn’t brought monopolization charges in decades, so far the defendants seem to face the same range of punishment that more common cartelization charges bring.

Although monopolization in violation of Section 2 of the Sherman Act is a felony with a statutory maximum of 10 years in prison for the offense, there’s almost no modern precedent for charging and sentencing this crime—because federal prosecutors simply haven’t brought one in decades. In fact, there isn’t even a specific guideline for monopolization offenses ...