Posted on 06/01/2019 6:33:11 PM PDT by DoodleBob
This video shows the Top 10 companies by market capitalization worldwide from 1998 to 2018. It includes American companies such as, Apple, Exxon Mobil, Microsoft, Walmart, General Electric, Amazon, as well as companies from other countries, such as Tencent, BP, Alibaba, Royal Dutch Shell, etc.
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
If you can't access the video, this picture is a nice summary of how the Invisible Hand may be more effective than trusting the same type of people who work at the Department of Motor Vehicles, to get it right in breaking up big liberal tech:
It's pretty clear they have.
So the next question is whether their abuse is egregious enough to justify intervention. Not a clear-cut decision.
Can you name 1 time gov anti trust policy was beneficial?
Communism has left the building
This is old. Microsoft is back on top and they were hit by DOJ in the past.
Pretty clear movement of the tech giants, financial companies and pharmaceuticals into the top ten— all of these are quasi monopolies in their fields.
I dont think that chart tells the full story. A lot of those companies move up the list just through mergers and a acquisitions not because other companies decline.
True, but that’s kind of a distinction without a difference if you’re just looking at who’s on top. It would be interesting to separate organic growth from growth through M&A, because it’s a lot tougher to grow organically as fast as by just acquiring someone. But that’s what a lot of these tech companies have done and why their growth and dominance is so impressive.
For example, Apple has acquired over 100 companies yet virtually none are recognizable names, nor did they contribute much to the bottom line. But they each had unique and useful technology that Apple was able to integrate into it’s platforms and leverage. In contrast, GE has bought and sold large businesses for many years (think NBC Universal or RCA) and look where it’s gotten them.
Ma Bell?
I am not certain if it was an anti-trust action, but when they broke AT&T apart, phone rates went down (up until the break-up long distance calls were 25 cents a minute in 1970 money), service went up, and innovation went off the charts.
I remember when you had to put a deposit down to get a phone that you rented and long distance calls were costly. When you moved, it took an eternity to get your deposit back. Now, my wife and I pay $70 for two phones (that we own) with unlimited long distance, text and data.
Ok good point but there arenot many and a lot of damage had been done by the enforcers
But there are lots of examples of beneficial antitrust actions going back to Standard Oil. AT&T breakup and the consent decree against IBM are two more examples; both of those lowered costs to consumers and led to greater innovation in the affected industries.
Not all monopolies are illegal. We actually have some areas where they're needed.
But you should not be fooled into believing that large corporations are beneficial to free market capitalism; they aren't. Their CEO's are typically fascists--I won't say "crony capitalists" because there is no such thing--who do everything they can to destroy competition and force costs up for their small competitors, who are the real engines of capitalist economies.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.