When it’s easy for businesses (large and small) to do business in a nation, that nation becomes wealthy. But when a business becomes a monopoly—whether it be privately owned or government owned—it becomes a problem.
Will there be victims in a state that has a free market economy? Of course. But unfortunately, there is no system which results in equal outcomes for all. We live in a fallen world.
Businesses are like the wolves of society. This does not mean that all (or any) of the animals like wolves, but it does mean they serve an important function. The greater the push for equal outcomes, the greater the destruction of that function (see Equality of Input vs Equality of Outcome | Jonathan Haidt).
The following three things help large corporations establish monopolies.
Big Government
The bigger the government, the more favours the government can grant.
The more money there is to be made from government (or the more that can be lost from a failure to cooperate with the government of the day, see the video below), the more corrupt businesses and politicians tend to be.
Excessive Regulation
The following video explains why big business in generally is behind excessive regulation in the West. (Watch from the 22nd minute. Click “Watch this video on YouTube” below.)
Note: Some regulation is necessary. (In China they have almost no regulation (see here), allowing almost anything—including dangerous work practices and the theft of intellectual property. The guiding principle seems to be that if it benefits the CCP, it is allowed. In many ways—despite China's totalitarian government—China is the most laissez-faire economy in the world.)
A good example of how big business manipulated government and pro-consumer groups to get their way, were the railroad monopolies in America. Milton Friedman explains how they did it here. See also.
The final way big businesses establish monopolies is counterintuitive, but just as important as the other two.
The Minimum Wage
A good example of how big business uses the minimum wage to crush their smaller competitors is Amazon. Amazon paid their workers little, but after pressure generated from the media raised their workers wages. But immediately after raising wages, they started lobbying the federal government to increase the minimum wage. Being far more mechanised, Amazon does not have to pay as much in wages as their competition. They know that a higher minimum wage will hurt their competitors, making it easier for them to establish a monopoly. See Why Some Capitalists Are the Worst Enemies of Capitalism.
Crony capitalism (corporatism) is the problem. (Few know this, but what the World Economic Forum describes as The Great Reset, is an attempt by many of the largest corporations in the world, to establish an absolute monopoly, a kind of international mercantilism, that can never be challenged. They say they need to do this to increase efficiency and save the planet. They are doing this with the help of the most powerful economies in the world. Part of their program involves giving countries and corporations ESG scores, and granting credit to those with high scores. But the whole thing is a scam. China has a very high ESG score and Tesla a low score, because Elon Musk (at the time of this writing) has not been playing their game. See China is painting Mountains Green to fool Environmentalists - No, Really and the two part documentary The Great Global Reset (see also The Great Reset | Facts Ep. 8).
We need a return to small business. When there are lots of small businesses, and many of them are growing, that is a sign of a healthy free market economy.
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