Letters

From the June 1999 issue

More Sensible Sex Discussion

Cathy Young's article ("Sex & Sensibility," March) was the most sensible discussion of gender differences I've run into in a long time.

One addition: You can't use gender stereotypes (or their absence) to predict what fields women will enter when the glass ceiling is lifted. You have to look at where they were before. Hence, bookkeepers became accountants (myself among them). Nurses went to medical school. Legal secretaries went to law school. Engineering secretaries didn't become engineers because, by and large, there was no clear and obvious progression from one to the other. The progression from mechanic to technician to engineer was and still is a largely male career path from bottom to top.

The next rush was women entering professions traditional to the men in their families: Policemen's daughters became cops and soldiers' daughters joined the armed services. Again, these were things they were familiar with, if only (this time) at second hand.

Patricia (Pat) Mathews
[e-mail]

Microsoft's Misdeeds

I greatly enjoyed James V. DeLong's piece on antitrust ("The New Trustbusters," March). I'm afraid he's right about the rebirth of antitrust activism--and this may be just the beginning. I knew I should have taken all the light bulbs with me when I left the Federal Trade Commission in 1989.

However, Mr. DeLong's visceral opposition to antitrust enforcement has prevented him from properly analyzing the Microsoft case. He says the government is trying to prove that Microsoft is a meanie and that the government hasn't successfully proved that Microsoft is a monopoly. Wrong on both counts.

Microsoft so obviously has a monopoly that denying it doesn't pass the laugh test --even in Washington. More than 90 percent of PCs are shipped with Microsoft Windows installed; Microsoft's prices have risen faster than hardware components; and entry into the PC operating system market is clearly all but impossible. If that doesn't indicate the existence of a monopoly, then there are no monopolies.

Second, the government has been trying to prove not that Microsoft is a meanie (Microsoft has made that case), but that the meanie engaged in restrictive practices which produced no economic efficiencies. According to press accounts of the trial, the government seems to have had considerable success in making that case.

Antitrust law says there are certain restrictive practices which, when engaged in by monopolists, are illegal. Even "public choice" theorists like Mr. DeLong who realize that the history of antitrust enforcement is dark indeed should be able to understand that a good case comes along every now and then.

Daniel Oliver
Chairman (1986-89) Federal Trade Commission
Washington, DC

"The New Trustbusters" didn't address what I consider to be Microsoft's most insidious practice: shrink-wrap licensing. Microsoft may not be the only company that uses this method, but its licenses are among the most restrictive.

It is impossible to buy a laptop without paying for Windows. Even VA Research, a vendor that specializes in Linux, includes Window disks and manuals when you buy a "naked" laptop (no operating system) from them. This is because all the laptop manufacturers have a per-processor licensing arrangement with Microsoft. Microsoft gets paid even if Windows is not installed or used. (Licensing applies to desktops and servers as well, although you can avoid it by building your own.)

According to Microsoft's End User Licensing Agreement (EULA), you cannot sell, rent, or lend the software because it is licensed to that particular machine. Also, you are not allowed to use the software if you do not agree with the license. So non-Window users are in the position of paying for Windows even if they do not use it.

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