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Comment by adrr | Hacker News Reader

Because they are US companies. Which is the main reason the US won't regulate them. EU is all about being anti-competitive, look at Airbus, InBev or LVMH. As long as it's their own companies being anti-competitive. Apple isn't even the market leader in EU, and EU is going to regulate them. That is anti-competitive. Let's go regulate the 2nd place company.

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What difference does them being a US company make? They're listed on the NASDAQ? The CEO lives in the US? Seriously, what does it mean to be a US company?

> look at Airbus, InBev or LVMH.

I did. Google's EU division had more revenue than any of those companies worldwide. It seems like Google's EU division (which is an EU company owned entirely by Google) is a bigger EU company than any of those three.

> what does it mean to be a US company?

Easy enough question to answer by looking at the beneficial owners of a company's stock. I'd wager every "US company" as commonly understood is, in addition to being listed on US stock exchanges, headquartered in the US, and having significant operations in the US, is also majority-owned by American citizens.

Interesting distinction. I'm not sure it's possible to confirm this, but I would be interested in the different firms that were listed.

Specifically, I don't know about AirBus and LVMH, but InBev seems to be primarily owned by American based mutual funds.

When I read comments like this on HN, I honestly wonder if the commenter believes this to be true, or if it's rhetoric or maybe trolling.

I live in the EU (well, some of the time), and I honestly believe that what the above commenter says is at least partially true. The EU are being protectionist, and usually only pass these types of regulations in sectors they have little to offer in the way of competition. I eagerly await the moment they target Airbus or car manufacturers.

The EU is categorically less protectionist than the US, and is one of the most open economies in the world.

If you honestly believe otherwise, you are intentionally misinformed.

Sample size of one.

We hosted a German foreign exchange student.

He was very aware of famous Youtubers, utilize Google for searches, watched Tiktok constantly. He owned the latest iPhone. His English was amazing.

In certain respects, I wasn't sure if we ever offered him a radically different experience than when he experienced living in Hannover.

Big (U.S.) Tech was very embedded in his life.

It's blatantly true. Just compare the fines of VW who explicitly systematically cheated emissions tests on diesel vehicles to EU fines on Google... for recommending google products on google websites. Services are the one piece of trade between the US and EU which the US is a net exporter. Considering the number of fines and taxes which explicitly target those it's pretty clear what's going on.

Do you believe the EU is more protectionist than the US? If so, you are too biased to have a meaningful conversation with.

What causes you to perceive the EU to be less protectionist?

The EU precovid had a net positive trade balance with the rest of the world. [1].

The US precovid had a net negative trade balance of nearly $50 Bn a month. [2].

The balance of trade between the US and EU is quite remarkably in the favor of the EU for trade with a "protectionist state ". How do you explain this discrepancy? If the US is so protectionist why are exports as a percentage of its GDP 1.58 times smaller than that of the EU [3][4]?

[1]: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/d... [2]: https://www.bea.gov/news/2020/us-international-trade-goods-a... [3]: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php... [4]: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/B020RE1Q156NBEA

As I replied to safety1st, a trade surplus is not evidence of protectionism. The EU has a comparable (slightly better) Weighted Mean Tariff Rate to the US, and both are the most open large economies in world.

It's unsupportable nonsense to claim otherwise.

Tariffs are only *one* means of trade policy. Pretending that they are the end all be all is nonsense. One quick example: France passed a Tax bill which targets only companies with revenues of more than 25 million euros there and 750 million globally. The catch? There's 30 companies which it applies to, but only one which is French[1]. Thus it is officially classified as merely local tax and not a tariff but in effect is a tariff on large foreign companies to give pricing advantages to local French ones. But per your measurement is a zero percentage tariff.

There are plenty of other subsidies and policy making ways to be protectionist.

And if it really were such nonsense to suggest other wise, why can you not explain the discrepancy of the US - EU trade balance. It should be simple.

[1]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48947922

Wait what? The US runs a massive trade deficit with the world because it's extremely open about giving other countries access to its markets. The EU doesn't, in some years it actually runs a surplus. They're not ultra protectionist like China but I was certainly under the impression that they were more so than the US.

See "Free Trade Rankings, 2019" here: https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/040115/which-countr...

A trade surplus is not evidence of protectionism. The most common metric to measure protectionism (in as far as it can be measured statistically) is the Weighted Mean Tariff Rate. Compare the EU at 1.48% to the US at 1.52% - the EU is slightly lower and both are among the lowest in the world, certainly of the large economies.

It's literal misinformation to say that the EU is more protectionist than the US. It was a Trump talking point, and never based in fact.

EU: https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/tariff-rate-appl...

US: https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/tariff-rate-appli...

If Weighted Mean Tariff rates are the only measurement for trade that could be true. But it is not. You have subsidies and you have policy and regulations which can cause non market barriers to entry. Case & point: China doesn't have any tariff on American social media companies but simply bans American companies. Per your chosen measurement, that is simply not considered.

How does Tesla fit in this, building a factory in Brandenburg against "some" public resistance? This case did not seem anti-competitive at all.

ah yes "anti-competitive" and not "pro consumer"

nice choice of words

They are different things. Product dumping to get rid of your competition is anti-competitive even though lower priced is pro-consumer.

> Apple isn't even the market leader in EU, and EU is going to regulate them.

They have a monopoly on iphones.

By this logic every company is a monopoly, as they have a monopoly on their own product.

> Courts do not require a literal monopoly before applying rules for single firm conduct; that term is used as shorthand for a firm with significant and durable market power — that is, the long term ability to raise price or exclude competitors. That is how that term is used here: a "monopolist" is a firm with significant and durable market power. Courts look at the firm's market share, but typically do not find monopoly power if the firm (or a group of firms acting in concert) has less than 50 percent of the sales of a particular product or service within a certain geographic area. Some courts have required much higher percentages. In addition, that leading position must be sustainable over time: if competitive forces or the entry of new firms could discipline the conduct of the leading firm, courts are unlikely to find that the firm has lasting market power.

> Obtaining a monopoly by superior products, innovation, or business acumen is legal; however, the same result achieved by exclusionary or predatory acts may raise antitrust concerns.

https://www.ftc.gov/advice-guidance/competition-guidance/gui...

Most other products cannot run apps. There is no alternative supplier of iOS devices so that people can run the apps that they bought from other companies via the Appstore.

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