Price Discrimination Handbook

The circumstances under which sellers can charge different prices to different customers, and customers can accept those prices, continue to raise serious compliance issues, and generate litigation under the federal Robinson-Patman Act, various state statutes in the United States and, increasingly, under the competition laws in jurisdictions located throughout the world. This informative handbook is the first major publication dedicated solely to price discrimination issues in over 20 years.

The book provides a detailed review of federal and state price discrimination laws, as well as an overview of price discrimination law in the European Union; selected EU member countries; China; India; Brazil; and a number of other jurisdictions throughout the globe.

The Price Discrimination Handbook is intended to be a comprehensive resource regarding price discrimination law in the United States and in jurisdictions located throughout the world, and is addressed both to practitioners who spend significant time on price discrimination issues as well as the general practitioner seeking guidance on these issues. This handbook contains some of the most important information on compliance with price discrimination laws in a single reference that can be used to evaluate pricing programs and policies that affect U.S. interstate commerce, apply in a single U.S. state, or that raise potential issues in one or more foreign jurisdictions.

The handbook is divided into four chapters.

Chapter I provides an overview of the theory and purposes of price discrimination laws. It defines and outlines the different forms of price discrimination, and explains the continuing debate over whether laws regulating price discrimination are compatible with the economic and legal underpinnings of other antitrust laws.

Chapter II provides an in-depth discussion of the Robinson-Patman Act (RPA), the principal federal price discrimination law. The chapter explains the law itself, how it relates to other antitrust jurisprudence, such as predatory pricing law, the elements of an RPA claim, and the defenses available to a party accused of price discrimination.

Chapter III explores the various approaches to price discrimination law among the states, which vary in their focus. The chapter also discusses state price discrimination laws that apply to particular industries, including motor vehicle and
motor fuel sales, dairy and other agricultural products, and alcoholic beverages, and who may enforce the various state price discrimination laws.

Chapter IV explores price discrimination laws in other countries in the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Africa. The chapter provides a global perspective readers should find useful, whether they counsel multinational businesses that need to be conscious of the laws where they do business, or merely want to understand how the price discrimination laws of various nations reflect their respective judgments about the balance between market efficiency and other social objectives.