Professor Mark Patterson was quoted in CBS News in an article examining big tech regulations after the presidential election.
Technology companies are facing their harshest attacks in Washington in at least two decades, back when Microsoft and its Windows software monopoly was the government’s top antitrust target.
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The Supreme Court has recently upheld companies’ ability to use these clauses in everything from credit card agreements to employment contracts, but polls show about two-thirds of Americans oppose them. The House antitrust report singled out arbitration as a way for companies to “avoid legal accountability for their actions…and hide behind a one-sided process that is tilted in their favor.”
Getting rid of mandatory arbitration “would be tremendously important everywhere,” said Mark Patterson, a professor of antitrust law at Fordham University. “The confidentiality with which arbitration and mediation are conducted prevents us from knowing about what’s going on in many markets. In these [technology]markets, where the use of information is so opaque, it’s especially important.”