How come there's only one Monopolies Commission?
Governments have monopolies on certain things, like eminent domain and deadly force.
Monopolies are bad and deserve their reputation when things are static and the monopolies function as toll collectors... But I think they're quite positive when they're dynamic and do something new.
We protect monopolies with copyright.
Instead of abandoning competition and giving banks protected monopolies once again, the public would be better served by making it easier to close banks when they get into trouble. Instead of making banking boring, let us make it a normal industry, susceptible to destruction in the face of creativity.
Software patents are dangerous to software developers because they impose monopolies on software ideas.
Trump makes really, really powerful arguments, for example in relation to healthcare. He talks about the cartels and the concentration of power and the health insurance companies effectively having monopolies and ripping people off.
Monopolies are bad because people get bad service for high prices. Competition is good because people get good service for competitive prices.
Cable companies aren't bad because they're parts of unwieldy media conglomerates. They're bad because they're monopolies (even where they are no longer legally exclusive) and because the government policies that made them monopolies rewarded lobbying over customer service.
India made a big mistake by signing up to TRIPS. With a population of 1.3 billion, India can't afford a monopoly in healthcare. Monopolies lead to higher prices and we can't allow them in a country like India with so much poverty and misery. It was like signing our own death warrant.
