Bill Maher Explains the Problem with Trumpism 5 Years Ago

[Lojik]

Originally Posted by Lune [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I watch merger after merger after merger happening at a quickening pace over the last 10-15 years. Every industry is quickly being conglomerated into as few as 1-3 entities, eliminating competition and fucking over consumers, small businesses, and labor. Even fiscal conservatives and trickle down dipshits will admit that monopolies are antithetic to fair and prosperous free market capitalism, and that the free market has no natural resolution for monopolies.

And yet the only entity capable of trust-busting activity, of shattering these monopolies and ensuring fair and healthy competition, is a strong federal government. Maybe you should pick up a history book and read about what capitalism was like before the government began actively breaking up monopolies, and why we're in a state of crisis precisely because our government is no longer doing this.

The problem isn't a natural monopoly, but rather when monopolies are protected by government, or when regulation favors big old companies. As companies become bigger, they have more clout with politicians and are able to lobby for regulations that are a hindrance to potential startup firms, artificially increasing barrier to entries and this also means that they have less of an incentive to innovate in industry and simply become rent seekers.

One can look at alcoa and standard oil examples where these companies were convicted of monopoly practices, yet production increased every year up until that point and prices dropped every year as well, hardly the behavior you'd expect from a predatory monopoly. An angle you can look at is if the effects they had on the environment were detrimental and going unchecked I guess.