fficiently riddled with loopholes to make effective implementation improbable. While arguably net global welfare is higher when a team relocates to a better market, public policy should focus on balancing the supply and demand for sports franchises so that all economically viable cities can have a team. Congress could mandate league expansion, but that is probably impossible politically. Even if such legislation were passed, deciding which city deserves a team is an administrative nightmare. A better approach would be to use antitrust to break up existing leagues into competing business entities. The entities could collaborate on playing rules and interleague and postseason play, but they would not be able to divvy up metropolitan areas, establish common drafts or player market restrictions, or collude on broadcasting and licensing policy. Under these circumstances no league would be likely to vacate an economically viable city, and, if one did, a competing league would probably jump in. Other consumer-friendly consequences would ow from such an arrangement. Competition would force ineffective owners to sell or go belly up in their struggle with better managed teams. Taxpayers would pay lower local, state, and federal subsidies. Teams would have lower revenues, but because most of the costs of a team are driven by revenues, most teams would remain solvent. Player salaries and team profits would fall, but the number of teams and player jobs would rise. Like Congress, the Justice Department's Antitrust Division is subject to political pressures not to upset sports. So sports leagues remain unregulated monopolies with de facto immunity from federal antitrust prosecution. Others launch and win antitrust complaints against sports leagues, but usually their aim is membership in the cartel, not divestiture, so the problem of too few teams remains unsolved. Citizen Action The final potential source of reform is grassroots disgruntlement that le...
