If Google Is Violating Antitrust Laws, What’s the Right Remedy?

This morning the U.S. Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit against Alphabet Inc.’s Google, which Bloomberg News notes “started out as a college research project in the late 1990s” and “now generates about $100 billion in highly profitable revenue each year.” The accusations are strong and numerous but the remedies sought are vague and few.

The Justice Dept. and its co-plaintiffs, who are state attorneys general, ask the federal district court in the District of Columbia to decree that Google acted unlawfully and “enjoin” it from anticompetitive behavior. OK, though vague. The specific fixes sought are even more nebulous. The complaint asks for “structural relief as needed to cure any competitive harm” and “any other preliminary or permanent relief necessary to restore competitive conditions.”