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An Empirical Investigation of the Paramount Antitrust Case
派拉蒙反托拉斯案經驗反思 （節(jié)選）
Richard Gil US-Santa Cruz
1. Introduction
Since the Sherman Act was passed by US Congress in 1890, the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission have prosecuted those which practices represented a restraint of trade for other. Since the very beginning vertical integration became one of the usual suspects to determine how and when a restraint of trade was taking place. This has not changed over time and still today antitrust authorities investigate the purpose and consequences of any upstream firm looking to vertically integrate into a downstream industry. Unfortunately for them, there is not a clear rule of thumb that determines when vertical integration will be innocuous to competition in a particular industry. This circumstance makes the regulatory task of authorities more colicated and enhances the value of the study of the consequnces of previous antitrust resolutions. This paper provides evidence from the Paramount antitrust cast that was resolved during the decades of the 1940s and 1950s using a new data set and hopes this way to serve as refernce for future antitrust action.
自1890年美國國會通過謝爾曼反托拉斯法案后，美國司法部和聯(lián)邦貿易委員會就開始對貿易管制行為進行起訴。垂直統(tǒng)一管理模式在最初受到很大質疑，通常被作為判斷是否有壟斷行為的標準。這點一直沒有發(fā)生改變，反壟斷調查今天仍然針對上游市場公司對下游市場公司進行垂直整合的動機和后果。不幸的是，垂直整合是否會危害一個特殊工業(yè)的自由競爭，現(xiàn)在還沒有經驗上的判定。這一情況使得權利調節(jié)工作變得錯綜復雜，同時，也讓反托拉斯研究變得更有價值。這篇論文將利用最新數(shù)據(jù)，通過對發(fā)生在40及50年代的派拉蒙反托拉斯案進行研究，以期提出對未來反托拉斯行動有價值觀點。
（中間略去數(shù)段，最不喜歡看前言了～～）
2. Industry Details and the Paramount Case
The movie industry is a typical example of a vertically organized industry. There exist three main agents in this industry: producers, distributors and exhibitors. As their names indicate, the producers are the agents in charge of movie production; the distributors are those that distribute movies into the exhibition market and the exhibitors are those agents that own theaters and provide movies to consumers directly. These can potentially be integrated into a same firm in different ways, production with distribution, distribution with exhibition or production, distribution and exhibition in one same firm. The first organizational form (production integrated with distribution) is common today in the US movie industry and other countries. The second organizational form is common in countries other than the US that feed their screens mostly with movies produced abroad. Finally the third type of organizational form mentioned above that integrated all three stages (production, distribution and exhibition) is the focus of attention of this paper. The most famous example of this organizational form is the case of the 5 major studios in the US previous to the Supreme Court ruling on the Paramount Case in 1948 that forced them to disintegrate.
電影工業(yè)是垂直整合的典型案例。該工業(yè)主要由三部分構成：制作、發(fā)行、放映。正如名稱透露出的信息一樣，制作是整個行業(yè)的領頭羊，發(fā)行方將電影發(fā)行到放映市場，而放映方則擁有自己的影院，并將電影直接提供給消費者。三個部分可以潛在的通過不同途徑被整合到一個公司中，包括：制作兼發(fā)行、發(fā)行兼放映、制作發(fā)行放映三位一體。第一種情況在今天的美國以及很多國家的電影工業(yè)中都比較常見。第二種是除了美國，將主要放映放置在國外的公司經常采用的模式。最后一種整合了三個部分的情況就是本文要重點考察的類型。這種組織形式最著名的案例就是1948年，美國高級法院在派拉蒙訴訟案中，做出的強制美國五大制片廠分割的判決。
Previous to 1916 there was no full integration in the US movie industry. In 1916, the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation acquired Bosworth, Inc. and the Paramount Corporation. As the general opinion was that the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation did so to monopolize the industry and restrict interstate commerce, the Department of Justice called the first Paramount case. This antitrust case started in 1921 when the FTC filed a complaint against Famous Players-Lasky arguing that they were using theater acquisition to induce exhibitors to accept determinate vertical restraints such as block booking. The FTC concluded that block booking was indeed an anticompetitive practice and the case resulted in a cease order for block booking in 1927 as well as a demand for reform on Paramount theater acquisitions. The Paramount-Famous-Lasky Corporation disputed the charges and as result the FTC announced they would ask the government to pursue antitrust action.
1916年以前，美國電影工業(yè)中不存在完全整合的情況。1916年，名人名?。够臼召徚瞬┧刮炙构竞团衫晒尽Ｒ驗槠毡檎J為，名人名劇－拉斯基公司的這種行為壟斷了行業(yè)，并且限制了州際貿易，所以美國司法部提出了第一次派拉蒙案。反壟斷案開始于1921年，F(xiàn)TC起草了一份針對名人名劇－拉斯基公司的起訴，認為該電影公司通過收購影院來減少放映商的數(shù)量，他們采用了諸如賣片花這樣的方式來達到垂直控制。聯(lián)邦貿易委員會判決認定，賣片花的確屬于阻礙自由競爭的行為。1927年，該案最終作出禁止賣片花的判定，并要求重組派拉蒙院線。名人名?。够緦Y果表示質疑，聯(lián)邦貿易委員會聲明，它們必須要求政府在反壟斷行動中表現(xiàn)積極。
On April of 1928, the Department of Justice filed an antitrust case against Paramount-Famous-Lasky Corporation and 9 others. After two rounds of appeals, the Supreme Court found in 1930 the ten distributors guilty of violating antitrust law and identified block booking as the main problem. The sentence was never enforced due to the Great Depression. Even in 1933 the distributors looked for protection under the National Industry Recovery Act. The government nullified the decree and suspended the antitrust case. As a result, the distributors were allowed temporarily to use block booking and vertical integration while the studios recovered financially from the Great Depression. By 1935 the studios had recovered financially and were in good condition again. There was a general concern that the studios had recovered their dominant situation by developing further their market power through the anticompetitive use of block booking and blind bidding in detriment of smaller independent producers and exhibitors. In particular, smaller independent producers complained that big studios linked their best feature movies to B-movies (some still in production!). Independent producers and exhibitors claimed that they did this through block booking and the use of the threat that they could show the movies on their own theaters.
1928年4月，美國司法部提出了針對派拉蒙－名人－拉斯基等其它九家公司的訴訟。經過兩輪上訴后，高級法院于1930年判定這十家發(fā)行商均違反了反壟斷法，而關鍵問題就是賣片花。由于大蕭條時期的到來，判決一直沒有強制執(zhí)行。甚至在1933年，發(fā)行商還尋求《國家產業(yè)復蘇法案》的保護。政府宣布判決無效，而且對反壟斷法提出質疑。結果，出于使制片廠能夠在大蕭條時期從金融危機中復蘇的目的，允許發(fā)行商臨時使用賣片花和垂直營銷模式。1935年，制片廠已經擺脫金融危機惡夢，進入良心發(fā)展。普遍認為，制片廠回復統(tǒng)治地位是建立在損害小型獨立制片商和放映商利益的基礎上的。小型獨立制片商特別譴責的就是，大型制片廠在他們最優(yōu)秀的長片之外捆綁B級片的做法。獨立制片商和發(fā)行商聲稱，大制片廠通過操縱賣片花和影院達到壟斷目的，因為他們可以在自己的影院放映自己的影片。
Besides this, the movie industry suffered of another worrying symptom: there was a popular feeling that the quality of the movies being produced by the major studios had declined severely during the 1930s due to the use of their market power. After the release of “Snow White” in 1938 by Disney and its tremendous success, Variety magazine identified this as a clear sign that quality was not going to come from the majors and blamed block booking as the cause of this. In response to this and as a response to lobbying of different groups and organizations, the Department of Justice announced in 1938 a suit against the eight biggest studios in Hollywood, 25 of their affiliated companies and 132 executive officers for monopolization in restraint of trade. Curiously enough, 1939 is for many the greatest movie year in history with movies such as Go with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz or Wuthering Heights.
除此以外，電影業(yè)又有其它另人擔憂的跡象出現(xiàn)：普遍感覺到大制片廠的影片質量在30年代出現(xiàn)大幅下滑，而且主要歸罪于濫用市場權利。1938年，迪斯尼的[白雪公主]獲得巨大成功，《綜藝》指出，這說明優(yōu)秀電影并非只能來自大片廠，同時批評了賣片花行為。作為對各大團體和機構的回應，美國司法部于1938年提出了針對八大制片廠，以及它們的25大聯(lián)營公司和132位執(zhí)行官的訴訟，起訴他們通過壟斷手法控制市場。值得注意的是，1939年是佳作輩出的一年，諸如[亂世佳人]、[綠野仙蹤]、[呼嘯山莊]都是在這一年制作發(fā)行的。
During 1939 the government refined its case and divided it into two different cases. The first case, even though not the focus of the paper here, was against several large independent theater chains. These exhibitors were accused of collusion jointly with the major studios and distributors to eliminate competition from smaller exhibitors.
1939年，政府重新評估案例并將其分割成兩類。第一類不是本文討論的重點，但它牽涉了一系列大型獨立院線。這些院線被控與大型制片商和發(fā)行商勾結，來削弱小型院線的競爭。
As the first of the two cases caught momentum, the studios asked the government to reach an agreement behind doors. As a result of these negotiations, the government issued in 1940 a Consent decree for which the Paramount case was called off. In return, the government regulated (not eliminated) block booking and prevented blind bidding through trade shows. The Consent decree was silent about the studios’ theater ownership and therefore the studios were allowed to keep their theaters. The reaction to this decree was not uniform across studios because the decree was negotiated by the five Majors leaving out Columbia, Universal and United Artists. None of these three had any theaters and they mainly relied on block booking to distribute their films (UA claimed to have never used block booking though). For this reason, the government set up an expiration date to fulfill block booking as contractual practice, the decree itself would expire and the government would reopen the case.
作為兩個案例的首要因素，大制片廠請求與政府達成閉門協(xié)議。雙方最終都做出讓步，1940年政府簽署《合約》撤銷了派拉蒙案。同時，政府削減（不是廢除）賣片花行為，并且阻止盲目投標（在看不到影片試映的情況下,為一部影片的放映權進行買賣交易的行為）?！逗霞s》沒有對制片廠的劇院所有權做出規(guī)定，因此，它們仍然保有劇院。這項判決未能在所有大片廠獲得共識，因為這其中只包括排除哥倫比亞、環(huán)球和聯(lián)藝的五大制片廠。這三家制片廠自身沒有影院，它們主要依靠賣片花來發(fā)行自己的影片（雖然聯(lián)藝并不承認這點）。因此，政府以合約慣例為由，制定了最后期限，這種判決等于槍斃了自己，政府后來不得不重開此案。
With the end of World War II and the expiration of the Consent decree, by October of 1945 the Big Eight studios and the federal government were in court for the second phase of the Paramount case. The studios could no longer hide behind the Great Depression and given the after-war windfall in attendance (1946 recorded an all-time record in attendance). Still the studios argued that economic conditions in overseas markets were still especially instable. The studios also argued that owning theaters assured an outlet for all movies they produced and claimed no monopoly existed. To all this, United Artists claimed not to understand of its presence in the trial since they neither owned theaters nor practiced block booking. The trial ended in January 1946 finding the eight studios guilty of restraint in trade focusing mainly in block booking and theater pooling. However the Big Five major studios were allowed to keep their theaters as long as they eliminated their theater pools. The solution of the court was held on competitive bidding where studios would be forced to accept the bid of “the highest responsible bidder.” 隨著二戰(zhàn)結束，以及《合約》中止，1945年10月，八大與聯(lián)邦政府就派拉蒙案二度對簿公堂。制片廠再也不能用大蕭條做掩護，并且開始在戰(zhàn)后復蘇中大發(fā)橫財（1946年達到最高記錄）。但是制片廠仍然以海外金融環(huán)境尚不穩(wěn)定力爭利益，并且表示，它們所有的影院只是放映自己拍攝的影片，并不存在壟斷。聯(lián)藝則在質疑自己為什么會被列入被告席，因為它們即不擁有影院，也沒有賣片花。1946年本案告結，八大制片廠被控主要通過賣片花和影院聯(lián)營壟斷市場。不過，五大被許諾，只要削減影院聯(lián)營，它們可以繼續(xù)保有影院。法院的解決辦法是，強制制片廠為“最高價責任競標人”競標。
No part was happy with this sentence and both decided to appeal to the Supreme Court. In three months, from February to May 1948, the Supreme Court reached a decision that overruled the decision reached by the New York District Court two years before. On one side, the Supreme Court confirmed the decision of the District Court of declaring the studios guilty of restraint in trade through the use of block booking, banning block booking and providing that all films should be sold in an individual basis from that moment on.
任何一方對此判決都不滿意，決定上訴到高級法院。從1948年2月至5月，最高法院決定駁回紐約聯(lián)邦地方法院兩年前達成的決定。一方面，最高法院肯定了聯(lián)邦地方法院確認的，賣片花是一種妨礙市場競爭的做法，并從那時起，禁止賣片花，并要求所有電影都應該在分割獨立的基礎上售賣。
The Supreme Court reversed the previous decision in two dimensions. The first instance has to do with the competitive bidding aspect. The court thought that not only this measure would not be effective but also it would impose a burden to the government in terms of monitoring costs and regulation. The second dimension was the recommendation of theater divorcement by the Big Five major studios. The case then went back to the New York District Court in what seemed an endless prolongation of the process. The Department of Justice encouraged at that point the Big Five majors to sign a consent decree that would allow them to opt out from the trial (and save millions in legal fees) as long as they agreed to a divorcement decree that separated their exhibition branches from distribution and production. This offer did not sound too attractive to the studios and the Big Five prepared to go back to Court to keep their theater holdings.
最高法院從兩個方面顛覆了最初的決定。初審的競標形式，在法院看來不僅不能產生任何影響，而且政府還要花費監(jiān)督和調節(jié)成本。第二方面是建議影院與五大片廠分離。這個案子最后又發(fā)回紐約聯(lián)邦地方法院，看起來簡直就是綿綿無期了。司法部鼓勵五大，只要它們將放映從制片發(fā)行環(huán)節(jié)分離，它們就可以選擇退出庭審（這樣可以節(jié)省上百萬的法律費用）。這種優(yōu)惠條件對制片廠來說并不誘人，五大準備將本案再次返回最高法院以保住它們的影院所有權。
What we see from that moment on is a gradual divesture of the Big Five studios. The timing of this process is far from random but still we can argue that goes against the will of studios’ owners. RKO was the first to separate from its theater branch. Howard Hughes, following his erratic behavior, decided suddenly in November of 1948 to separate his exhibition business from his studio and distribution branches. Hughes was looking with this sudden decision to institutionalize the sentence and to speed up the divesture process of the other studios. RKO was the smaller of the Big Five studios and the divesture could help equalize RKO competitive situation with the other four major studios.
我們看到的就是，這是一個對五大制片廠逐漸剝離的過程。時間表非常隨意，但我們仍然可以說，它危及了制片商的利益。雷電華第一個分離了它的影院系統(tǒng)?；羧A德·休斯，一如既往的驚世駭俗，它在1948年11月突然將自己的放映系統(tǒng)從制片發(fā)行系統(tǒng)中分離。休斯的這一舉動使得判決終于制度化，而且加速了其它制片廠的分離進程。雷電華在五大中相對較小，所以分割對它來說有利于改善它同其它四大的競爭環(huán)境。
The next studio to follow the sign-up of the decree was Paramount studios in February of 1949. Paramount’s reasons to divest from its theaters were far from similar to those of Hughes and RKO. Paramount had developed already at that time interests in the television market. Since the FTC could revoke any television license to any firm convicted with monopolistic practices, it was in the best interest of Paramount to sign the decree, divest from its theater holdings and focused on the new flourishing television industry. Fox and Warner followed in 1951 and finally MGM separated from its exhibition division in 1954.
接下來，派拉蒙在1949年2月執(zhí)行了判決。派拉蒙采取行動的原因跟雷電華的休斯大相徑庭。派拉蒙當時對電視市場很有興趣，鑒于FTC有權以壟斷為由撤銷任何電視經營權，派拉蒙最好的選擇就是簽署協(xié)議，剝離院線控制權，而將重點放到正在崛起的電視業(yè)。接著，?？怂购腿A納在1951年分割放映權，最后是1954年的米高梅。 As a result of this, 34 years after the beginning of the first Paramount case, the government through the Department of Justice had achieved what it was its first goal and never could enforce due to the Great Depression: ban block booking and force theater divesture from major studios. The Department of Justice was hoping with this to promote competition in movie industry and offer a shot to independent and smaller companies both in the exhibition business and the production business. It is the purpose of this paper to document whether the goals of the government were achieved through these two measures.
終于，歷經34年風風雨雨之后，司法部終于實現(xiàn)了當年因大蕭條而未能實現(xiàn)的，第一次派拉蒙案的初衷：禁止賣片花并強制影院從大制片廠分離。司法部希望以此促進電影業(yè)自由競爭，并且給小型或獨立片商在放映和生產領域提供一個機會。本文將檢討，政府是否通過這兩個措施達到了目的。
3. Data Description and Some Established Facts
The data used in this paper is data from the American Film Institute (AFI) movie catalog. The Catalog provides authenticated online information on every feature-length film produced in America or financed by American production companies from 1893 to 1970. The information included in the data set includes details on cast, crew, plot summaries, subjects, genres and historical notes for each film.
（本文所使用的數(shù)據(jù)來自美國電影協(xié)會（AFI）的電影目錄。）
We collected information for all movies produced in the United States from 1940 to 1960. This means that we eliminated from our sample all movies produced by foreign studios even if this were studios owned by American studios’ subsidiaries. We also deleted from our sample all those movies produced by the government and the army.
（例子都選自1940年至1960年在美國拍攝的電影。不包括國外，即使隸屬于美國的制片公司，也不包括政府和軍方制作的電影）
Most of these were documentaries and news reports about World War II and the Korea War. Finally, we drop all data from 1960 because at the time of data collection AFI had not finished inputting all entries for that year. As a result, movies from 2 major studios were not listed and therefore we decided to leave this year out of the period under study. Since most of the events of our interest occur between 1948 and 1955, we do not think leaving 1960 out of the analysis will affect results from our analysis.
（本文沒有研究60年代的數(shù)據(jù)，因為不完整，而且相信對本課題影響不大）
（略去一段）
The final data contain information for 7,441 movies produced in the US between 1940 and 1959 (20 years total). 6% of these movies had more than one studio involved in their production. We call these movies co-production for the purposes of the paper. In total we observe 1,141 different production companies. 147 of these companies only show once and in a co-production and 746 studios show once as only producers. This means that there are only 248 studios that produced movies in 2 or more years during the two decades under study. Out of these 248 studios, only 15 studios produced movies in 10 or more years during this period. This gives an idea of how concentrated movie production was in this industry. We also have information on movie duration for 7,376 of these movies. The average movie duration during this period is 78 minutes. We also got information on TV penetration and theater admissions. We got data from the Television Factbook 1964 on yearly TV saturation (% homes in the US with a TV). Even though TV saturation was 0 until 1945 it went up to 86% in 1959. Movie admissions averaged 1,236 millions over the two decades and peaked in 1946 with the all time record of 1692 million admissions.
最終的數(shù)據(jù)來源于自1940到1959年間在美國生產的7441部影片。6％的影片涉及超過一家公司的參與。本文稱之為合拍片。我們總共考察了1141家不同制作公司，147家只作為合作方出現(xiàn)過一次，746家僅作為制片方出現(xiàn)過一次。這就意味著只有248家公司在這20年中生產過兩部或兩部以上的電影，而在這248家中，又僅僅有15家超過10部。這說明電影行業(yè)是一個多么集中的行業(yè)。這些影片的總長度是7376分鐘，所以平均每部的片廠是78分鐘。還有關于電視業(yè)和劇院的信息。我們從1964年的《電視概況》中獲得年度電視飽和度（美國擁有電視家庭所占比例），盡管電視飽和度在1945年還是零，但在1959年飚升了86％。20多年中，電影平均收入為12.36億，1946年創(chuàng)下16.92億記錄。
The total number of movies produced in 1940 was above 500. This number quickly declined to 400 movies by 1944 and stayed at that range until 1950. From 1951 on, the number of movies produced by the US movie industry decreased until reaching the production of level of 200 movies annually in 1959.
1940年生產的電影總數(shù)超過500。1944年迅速下滑至400部并基本持平至1950年。然后從1951年開始，電影生產數(shù)量持續(xù)下滑，最終到1959年減為每年200部的行業(yè)水平。
Another established fact of this industry is the increase in movie duration during this period of time. We observe from our data set the duration of all movies privately produced in the US. We see from Figure 2 below that by 1940 the average movie duration was around 73 minutes. This average duration started increasing by 1945 until reaching the average duration of 90 minutes in 1959. This increase in duration is steady and we do not observe any change in trend across time.
該行業(yè)另一確定的事實是，在這段時間中，每部電影的長度變長。我們的數(shù)據(jù)是基于所有在美國制作的影片。我們在下圖2中可以看到，到1940年，影片平均長度是73分鐘，從1945年開始，這個數(shù)字一直增加，一直到1959年的90分鐘。這一增長非常穩(wěn)定，我們沒有在增長趨勢上發(fā)現(xiàn)任何變化。
The third established fact is a change in the modus operandi in Hollywood. As the years passed the golden years of the Hollywood studios were over and studios changed their decision of production and financing for that matter. We observe very clearly in Figure 3 below how the share of co-produced movies is roughly constant from 1940 to 1950 around 2.5%. This changed after 1950 when the share of movies co-produced explodes to 10% the next year and increases up to 15% by 1955.
第三個確定的事實就是好萊塢策略的變化。隨著好萊塢黃金時代的結束，各大制片廠改變了它們在生產和金融方面所做的決定。從表3可以很清楚的看到，從1940年到1950年，合拍片的份額維持在2.5％。1950年之后發(fā)生急劇變化，合拍片份額激增到10％，到1955年增長到15％。
Finally, our data on TV saturation (% homes in the US with TV) shows in Figure 4 how the introduction of television was quick after 1946. It went from 0.02% in 1946 to 65% in 1955 and 78% by 1985. Popular press has tended to interpret this quick development of television in American society as a major force behind the changes experienced by the movie industry during these two decades. According to this, the first consequence of the introduction of television came through movie theater revenues which decreased steadily between 1946 and 1959 (see Figure 5). The goal of this paper is not examine whether this statement is either accurate or fair. The goal of this paper is to explore whether television introduction had an effect on the changes occurred in the movie industry and assess the importance of the Paramount case as we take into account the importance of television.
最后，在表4中顯示了電視飽和度（美國家庭擁有電視的百分比）1946年后迅速上升。從1946年的0.02％到1955年的65％，最后上升到1985年的78％。流行媒體傾向于把電視的迅速發(fā)展解釋為在這20年中影響電影的重要因素。電視的增加造成的第一個后果就是使1946年到1959年間的影院收入持續(xù)降低（圖5）。本文將解釋為何電視的進入會改變電影工業(yè)，以及評估派拉蒙案對電視業(yè)的重要性。
4. Implications of Antitrust Action and Empirical Methodology Following the industry details above, we discuss the intention of the Department of Justice with the Paramount case. In this case, we describe the expected consequences of the ruling on studio performance and decisions by the Department of Justice and the methodology we will use to test whether the case had any effect on the industry.
前面我們討論了司法部對派拉蒙案的意見。在這一小節(jié)中，我們將描述此案對制片廠行為的管理，司法部的決定，并運用方法論評估此案是否對工業(yè)產生了影響。
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