Saturday, March 20, 2010

[ztdrgfxy] Corporations excluding competition by politics

There are two ways for a producer to make economic profit in the face of competition.  One is to make a better product than your competitors (product differentiation).  Consumers win.

The other is to eliminate or exclude competition to rake in monopoly or oligopoly profits.  Consumers lose.

Particularly insidious is a corporation using politics to eliminate their competition, by exclusion or setting up barriers to entry. They are getting laws passed to make profit, ultimately at society's expense.

Two extremely difficult problems: 1. Identify all these laws and regulations and repeal or overturn them on the grounds of anti-trust, unless there is some well-documented circumstance to keep it.

2. Make such political involvement criminally illegal.  Corporations are free to be involved in politics, but may not lobby for anti-competitive actions.  Yes, we are limiting free speech, but it is for a good cause: to maintain a free economy.

However, identifying this now-illegal free speech might be difficult.  It might be fine for a corporation to lobby for a law to steer society toward a product the corporation produces, if there is nothing preventing others from also producing that product.  However, if the corporation has a patent, then it is anti-competitive and illegal.  Furthermore, the practice of corporations influencing government to secure monopolies or oligopolies is so blatantly legal these days that it will require a drastic mind shift.

Inspired by "Comcast lobbies to slow Philadelphia Verizon FiOS".

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