This is THE INDICATOR FROM PLANET MONEY. I'm Darian Woods. And I'm Paddy Hirsch. Meta and Apple - two of the biggest companies in the world - are breaking the law.
这里是THE INDICATOR FROM PLANET MONEY。我是Darian Woods。我是Paddy Hirsch。Meta和Apple是世界上最大的两家公司,正在违反法律。
What? At least, according to European regulators. And Apple being hit with the first charge under the EU's new Digital Markets Act... Corporate criminals run amok. Scofflaws...
什么?至少,根据欧洲监管机构的说法是这样。Apple受到欧盟新颁布的《数字市场法案》(DMA)的第一项指控……企业罪犯横行无忌。违法者……
...Digital scofflaws. The Digital Markets Act is a new piece of European legislation aimed at making markets in the digital sector, quote, "fairer and more contestable."
……数字违法者。《数字市场法案》是欧洲的一项新立法,旨在使数字领域的市场“更加公平和更具竞争力”。
It's essentially a piece of what people in the business world call antitrust regulation.
本质上是商界人士所说的反垄断法规的一部分。
That is rules to make sure that no one company or group of companies make an area of business uncompetitive.
这些规则旨在确保没有一家公司或公司集团使某个业务领域失去竞争力。
And this applies to seven big companies - Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Booking, ByteDance, Meta and Microsoft.
这适用于七家大公司——苹果、亚马逊、Alphabet、缤客、字节跳动、Meta和微软。
Yeah, for those who are counting, that's six American companies and one Chinese company.
对于那些正在计算的人来说,这是六家美国公司和一家中国公司。
And the compliance is costing them hundreds of millions of dollars, if not billions. But it's not the money that's freaking these companies out.
遵守该法规让他们损失了数亿美元,甚至数十亿美元。但让这些公司感到恐慌的并不是金钱损失。
It's the fact that where Europe goes with these antitrust laws, the rest of the world could follow. But not America. No, over here, we have our own ways of doing things.
欧洲实施这些反垄断法,世界其他国家可能会效仿。但美国不会。在美国,我们有自己的做事方式。
Today, we're going to find out what those ways are and how the U.S. handles antitrust differently to the European Union now that the DMA is in force. That's all coming up after the break.
今天,我们将找出这些方式是什么,以及在DMA生效后,美国处理反垄断的方式与欧盟有何不同。这些将在休息后继续。
American governments have been fighting the fight against monopolies and anticompetitive practices since the late 1800s.
自19世纪末以来,美国政府一直在与垄断和反竞争行为作斗争。
Back then, John D. Rockefeller, who owned Standard Oil, came up with the idea of teaming up with other oil companies in what was called a trust structure to operate more effectively and profitably across state lines.
当时,拥有标准石油公司的约翰·D·洛克菲勒提出了与其他石油公司合作的想法,即所谓的信托结构,以便更有效、更有利可图地跨州运营。
But companies who jumped on this trust bandwagon were accused of abusing their market power and creating monopolies, and that pushed Congress to pass the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890.
但那些加入这种信任潮流的公司被指控滥用市场力量并制造垄断,这促使国会通过了1890年的《谢尔曼反托拉斯法》。
The act made it illegal for companies to conspire to fix prices or rig markets or to attempt to monopolize a market.
该法案规定,公司合谋操纵价格、操纵市场或试图垄断市场都是违法的。
In other words, America has been doing antitrust for more than a century. The European Union, on the other hand, has only been in existence since - in its earliest iteration - 1958.
换句话说,美国已经实施反垄断法一个多世纪了。另一方面,欧盟自1958年(最早的一次)成立以来才刚刚开始实施。
But Meredith Broadbent of the Center for Strategic and International Studies says Europe sure is making up for lost time.
但美国国际战略研究中心的梅雷迪斯·布罗德本特表示,欧洲肯定正在弥补失去的时间。
They're pretty energetic regulators in Brussels, and they have taken it upon themselves to iterate a lot of legislation, regulation related to the tech sector.
布鲁塞尔的监管者非常有活力,他们主动迭代了许多与科技行业相关的立法和监管。
Meredith is a former chair of the U.S. International Trade Commission. So she knows her antitrust, and so does Bill Baer, who led antitrust enforcement at the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission.
梅雷迪斯曾任美国国际贸易委员会主席。所以她了解反垄断,比尔·贝尔(Bill Baer)也了解,他曾领导司法部和联邦贸易委员会的反垄断执法工作。
Now he's at the Brookings Institution. He says the new Digital Markets Act has made a big difference in the way antitrust is handled either side of the Atlantic.
现在他在布鲁金斯学会任职。他说,新的《数字市场法案》对大西洋两岸的反垄断处理方式产生了重大影响。
The U.S. laws are very broadly written. You know, you can't monopolize or attempt to monopolize, whereas in Europe, they have some broad prohibition.
美国的法律规定非常宽泛。你不能垄断或试图垄断,而欧洲有一些广泛的禁令。
But this new legislation - the Digital Markets Act - does set out specific guardrails about what can and cannot be done.
但这项新立法确实对可以做什么和不可以做什么设定了具体的护栏。
Guardrails. Well, if that makes you think nanny state, it's actually kind of helpful to think of the business environment like a kids' playground - fenced in with very clear boundaries set by legislation. And every country in the world has its own version of this playground.
如果这让你想到保姆国家,那么将商场想象成一个儿童游乐场可以帮助理解,用立法设定非常明确的边界围起来。世界上每个国家都有自己的游乐场。
And here in the U.S., the playground is just like a public city park. Anyone is free to play, no matter how big or small.
在美国,游乐场就像一个公共城市公园。任何人都可以自由玩耍,无论年龄大小。
And because the rules governing the park have been in place for more than a century, everyone knows how to conduct themselves.
而且由于管理公园的规则已经存在了一个多世纪,每个人都知道如何行事。
Big kids aren't allowed to bully smaller kids. You can't gang up. You can't monopolize the swing set. It's pretty simple.
大孩子不可以欺负小孩子。不能结伙。不能独占秋千。这很简单。
And the playground here in the U.S. is kind of monitored by two agencies - the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission.
美国的游乐场由两个机构监控——司法部和联邦贸易委员会。
They're kind of like neighborhood cops cruising around in their patrol car just keeping an eye on things.
他们就像社区警察一样,开着巡逻车四处巡逻,监视着周围情况。
In Europe, though, the playground is different. They've now got a uniformed guard on the park gate - the European Commission.
然而,在欧洲,游乐场有所不同。公园门口现在有一名穿制服的警卫——欧洲委员会。
And thanks to the Digital Markets Act, the commission has a very specific job - to separate the big kids, like Apple and Meta, from the small ones, like Nokia or Spotify.
由于《数字市场法案》,委员会有一项非常具体的工作——将苹果和Meta等大公司与诺基亚或Spotify等小公司区分开来。
Yeah, the commission steps in and says, hey, you big kids. If you want to play here, you have to behave in a certain way while you're in this park.
委员会介入并说,嘿,你们这些大孩子。如果你想在这里玩,你必须在这个公园里以某种方式行事。
And here's a list of things that you can't do. And the big kids, well, they have to agree to these rules that have been set specifically for them.
以下是你不能做的事情。而大公司则必须遵守这些专门为他们制定的规则。
A plan of compliance, mutually, not to favor their own products, not to give special favors to sellers or advertisers on their platforms.
相互遵守,不偏袒自己的产品,不给平台上的卖家或广告商提供特殊优惠。
And those are rules that do not exist - at least at this moment - in the United States.
而这些规则至少目前在美国不存在。
All right. So that's one big difference between the U.S. and Europe. The next is what happens when someone breaks the rules.
这就是美国和欧洲之间的一大区别。其次是当有人违反规则时会发生什么。
In the European playground, if one of those big kids gets out of control and breaks the rules that they signed up to, like Apple or Meta, the European Commission steps in and slaps them with a short investigation.
在欧洲的游乐场,如果其中一个大公司失控并违反了他们签署的规则,比如苹果或Meta,欧盟委员会就会介入并对他们进行短暂的调查。
And if the commission finds them guilty, they have to either make changes or are fined.
如果委员会认定他们有罪,他们要么做出改变,要么被罚款。
In the U.S., though, it's not quite so formal. Remember those cops cruising the neighborhood - the FTC and the DOJ?
然而,在美国,情况并没有那么正式。还记得那些在街区巡逻的警察吗——联邦贸易委员会和司法部?
Well, if they see something that they think looks dodgy here, they can't just step in like the European Commission does in Europe.
如果他们在这里看到他们认为可疑的东西,他们不能像欧洲委员会在欧洲那样直接介入。
Instead, they have to go through the courts. And of course, that can take a long, long time.
相反,他们必须通过法院。当然,这可能需要很长很长时间。
So the government has a difficult and laborious task of trying to get the information it needs to decide whether to file a lawsuit in the first place.
因此,政府面临着一项艰巨而繁重的任务,即试图获取所需的信息,以决定是否首先提起诉讼。
And then once you do, there is further discovery, further investigation, both by the government and by the accused. Experts...
然后,一旦起诉了,政府和被告都会进行进一步的调查。
Paddy, I'm exhausted just thinking about it. I know. Depositions, cross-examinations, filings - we could be talking about years in court. Before the case gets to trial, there are depositions taken.
Paddy,光是想想我就累了。我知道。取证、交叉质询、备案——我们可能要花好几年时间在法庭上。在案件开庭审理之前,会进行取证。
And meanwhile, a lot of the time, it's business as usual for the company that's accused of wrongdoing. I mean, what? Yeah. So quite a different approach.
与此同时,很多时候,被指控有不法行为的公司一切如常。什么?是的。所以这是一种完全不同的方法。
Indeed. Justice, in other words, can be a lot swifter in Europe than in the U.S. when it comes to antitrust and the tech industry, even if there are those who think it's also a lot tougher in Europe.
确实如此。换句话说,在反垄断和科技行业方面,欧洲的司法速度可能比美国快得多,即使有些人认为欧洲的司法要严厉得多。
And there's one other difference - one that works very much in the regulator's favor in Europe, Bill says.
还有另一个区别——比尔说,这对欧洲的监管机构非常有利。
The European process allows the commission's orders to go into effect. And they do have an advantage over the U.S. in that once that decision is made and an order is issued, the companies need to comply immediately and pay a fine, if one is ordered, before they can appeal.
欧洲程序允许委员会的命令生效。他们确实比美国有优势,因为一旦做出决定并发布命令,这些公司需要立即遵守并支付罚款(如果被下达),然后才能上诉。
Wow. So it's like pay up first to claw back later, if you're lucky.
这就像先付钱,然后才能收回,如果你幸运的话。
Yeah. And it's small wonder these companies are squealing about these new rules, which are aimed at the biggest companies 'cause they have the most market power. And the EU says it wants to be sure that power isn't abused.
是的。难怪这些公司对这些新规则大喊大叫,这些新规则针对的是最大的公司,因为它们拥有最大的市场力量。欧盟表示,它希望确保这种权力不会被滥用。
Which sounds fair enough, but Meredith Broadbent of the Center for Strategic and International Studies says there's a perhaps unforeseen consequence to targeting the biggest firms.
这听起来很公平,但美国国际战略研究中心的梅雷迪斯·布罗德本特表示,针对最大的公司可能会产生意想不到的后果。
The way a lot of it's crafted is that all of the thresholds apply to U.S. companies and not EU companies.
很多规则的制定方式是,所有门槛都适用于美国公司,而不是欧盟公司。
Well, not all of their thresholds. I mean, there's one Chinese company, but yes, mostly U.S. companies.
不是所有的门槛。里面有一家中国公司,但没错,大多数都是美国公司。
So maybe it's not such an unforeseen consequence, after all. Maybe not. At least that's what Meredith thinks.
也许这并不是一个无法预料的后果。也许不是。至少梅雷迪斯是这么认为的。
I think Europe went through some thinking about this and decided that regulation was going to be a way to rein in the U.S. companies and hopefully make some room for their smaller companies.
我认为欧洲对此进行了一些思考,并决定通过监管来控制美国公司,希望为他们的小型企业腾出一些市场空间。
And Meredith isn't alone in her suspicions here. I mean, plenty of people, including tech industry associations here in the U.S., say the DMA discriminates against American companies.
梅雷迪斯并不是唯一一个有这种怀疑的人。很多人,包括美国的科技行业协会,都说DMA歧视美国公司。
But regardless of the EU's motivations, by creating the DMA, Europe's antitrust warriors have presented Big Tech with a big problem.
但无论欧盟的动机如何,通过创建DMA,欧洲的反垄断战士都给大型科技公司带来了一个大问题。
The EU is one of the three largest markets with China and the U.S. So it's kind of hard for a company to ignore, not least because now that Europe has written a lot of these rules, a lot of other countries could adopt them in their own markets.
欧盟是与中国和美国并列的三大市场之一。一家公司很难忽视这一点,尤其是因为现在欧洲已经制定了许多这样的规则,许多其他国家可以在自己的市场中采用。
Yeah, and it's inconvenient and expensive for the Alphabets and the Microsofts of this world to tailor their products to fit different regulatory regimes.
是的,对于Alphabets和微软这样的公司来说,定制自己的产品以适应不同的监管制度既不方便又昂贵。
So rather than fighting the DMA, they may just suck it up and fall in line with the European rules.
因此,他们可能不会与DMA抗争,而是选择忍受并遵守欧洲规则。