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‘Abusing its market position’: Klobuchar, AOC rip Ticketmaster ‘monopoly’ following Taylor Swift ticket debacle
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‘Abusing its market position’: Klobuchar, AOC rip Ticketmaster ‘monopoly’ following Taylor Swift ticket debacle
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On Tuesday, November 15, fans of pop star Taylor Swift were furious with Ticketmaster when ticket sales for forthcoming tour dates went on sale and the company’s website appeared to crash during the purchasing process. Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar was quick to speak out about that debacle, sending Ticketmaster CEO Michael Rapino a strongly worded open letter that was highly critical of the company’s practices.
The need for competition is one of the fundamentals of free-market capitalism, and Klobuchar complained that Ticketmaster “continues to abuse its market positions” by imposing high fees and engaging in the practices of a monopoly.
“Ticketmaster’s power in the primary ticket market insulates it from the competitive pressures that typically push companies to innovate and improve their services,” Klobuchar told Rapino in her November 16 letter. “That can result in the types of dramatic service failures we saw this week, where consumers are the ones that pay the price.”
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In 2010, Ticketmaster merged with another major company: Live Nation. At the time, critics of the merger warned that like so many corporate megamergers — from banks to airlines — the Ticketmaster/Live Nation merger would be terrible for consumers. And Klobuchar brought up that merger in her letter to Rapino.
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