Happy Wednesday, Athletics Nation!
Imagine you’re a barista. I mean, you may be—and if so I thank you for providing the life-giving essence of my favorite daytime beverage. But if you aren’t, imagine you are. And imagine that every coffee shop in the country pays exactly the same wage of $13 per hour. No matter how many shops you apply to or how good you are at making coffee, you will gross $104 for an eight hour shift.
Thankfully, we have antitrust laws that prohibit this sort of anticompetitive practice. But Major League Baseball was granted a special antitrust exemption 100 years ago that allows team owners to cooperate in fixing wages for their workers across the industry.