Should regulation be in place to prevent mergers?

[Optatron]

Except when you have no choice. Comcast for example. There is no other broadband internet provider in my area.

that, on the surface sounds pretty sad, but once you realize that nobody owes you such a service, and nobody has been rich or powerful enough to take them on, you'll see that while your life isn't perfect, ...........nobody sees the incentive to provide you choice, so they don't.

 

[Liberty Rebellion]

Just wondering what peoples thoughts are on this. Hasn't deregulation caused companies to merge like crazy lately? Then you have less competition and more monopolies?

What's wrong with mergers? What's wrong with a company having a monopoly that is providing low prices to consumers? If a more efficient firm can compete with those low prices they should enter the market and compete. If not, then what's the point of having competition just for the sake of having competition?

 

[Liberty Rebellion]

Except when you have no choice. Comcast for example. There is no other broadband internet provider in my area.

And, typically, that is the end result of some type of franchising agreement with local and/or state governments preventing other potential competitors from entering the market in the first place

 

[Bucjason]

Still waiting for someone to tell me exactly which "deregualtion" law was passed . Just claiming "deregulation" caused this is pretty vaque, and sounds like one of King Barry's talking points, but SHOW me the legislation you're actually talking about....


Besides, no good ever comes from the Government trying to micro-manage the market.

 

[Epic]

Except when you have no choice. Comcast for example. There is no other broadband internet provider in my area.

I have to believe government played a role here - they may have just explicitly given comcast an exclusive license (monopoly) in your area.

 

[muh_roads]

I have to believe government played a role here - they may have just explicitly given comcast an exclusive license (monopoly) in your area.

yep.

that, on the surface sounds pretty sad, but once you realize that nobody owes you such a service, and nobody has been rich or powerful enough to take them on, you'll see that while your life isn't perfect, ...........nobody sees the incentive to provide you choice, so they don't.

I don't need to be provided. But the reason why Comcast is the sole provider is because they lobby the FCC to give them this power. It is illegal for any other company like Charter or someone else to move into my area and offer competition.

For the government to protect them this way you have to admit is wrong.

 

[acptulsa]

why is merging and decreasing competition a bad thing?

competition is NOT good, it's only a good thing if it serves a good purpose (lower cost and better quality), it's not serving a purpose, it should be eliminated.

When does it fail to lower costs and act to improve quality?

No, nor do you.

Corporations are just as human as you, you have no rights, no matter what you believe.

Ma Bell is just as human as me? Funny, it doesn't show...

For the government to protect them this way you have to admit is wrong.

There's one case where it isn't inappropriate for government to step in and prevent a monopoly--when it's fixing its own screwup.

 

[andrewh817]

A read an article about this topic recently, might have been on Rockwell........ True monopolies rarely last long.

If a company has a good enough product and price range to draw all the consumers to their goods then why is that a bad thing? Sometimes people argue that the monopoly will raise its prices much higher once the competition is out of business. Doing this WILL decrease their revenues (unless it is an item people NEED) and they will either find the sweet spot between consumer affordability and profits, or another company will rise up to compete.

The problem with the monopolies now is that they extend to goods and services that people NEED. And as many have already said, the government inhibits the entry of new companies into the market to ensure the monopoly will stay a monopoly.

 

[jmlfod87]

YouTube - Anti-Trust and Monopoly (with Ron Paul)