Your company is one of the country's largest manufacturers of TVs. You typically sell your TVs to wholesalers, who in turn sell them to retailers. You have outstanding performance, produce quality TVs, and have a state-of-the-art system for inventory control. Despite this, a couple of months ago, due to a production error, you discovered that you had an inventory surplus of 10,000 TVs. You had discussed your options but determined that having a 10,000 TV surplus would have a serious effect on the economic condition of the company. You decided that your only realistic option was to place an ad in newspapers throughout the country offering to sell the TVs directly to the public at 10% below cost.

The Federal Trade Commission sent the company a letter saying that the actions violated the Sherman Act and other trade regulations because it was an unfair competition that harms small businesses. It pointed to complaints received from the company's competitors saying that they have lost so much business due to the discount sale that they might have to go out of business. The competitors advised that there was so little profit in the sale of TVs that they could not compete against sales below cost.

Post a recommendation on the new policy. The decision must:

(a) identify whether the recommendation is for the company to settle with the FTC or to lobby for a different promotional sales rule for future regulations,

(b) outline the issues,

(c) explain your rationale (i.e., apply any applicable rules to the facts given), and

(d) describe any conflicting views and why they have been rejected.