From: hibbert@netcom.com
Date: Thu Jul 19 2001 - 14:33:33 MDT
>> Have seen the movie "Rollerball", Lee?
As I recall, this movie was a work of fiction. If this is the best
argument for the existence and danger of monopoly, I don't think I'll need
to say much more.
talon57@well.com said:
> Once again, some markets require such a large initial investment that
> this excludes most competition.
You have to draw your lines very carefully in order to define such a
market. Please give an example in which the customers don't have
alternatives.
This is similar to the case several years ago when the government was
trying to decide whether to prosecute the three biggest makers of breakfast
cereals for monopolizing their market. In order to consider that
possibility, they had to ignore the fact that people have many other
choices. If the cereal companies raise prices too high, people will eat
eggs or waffles, or (heavens!) make sandwiches for breakfast.
The only examples I know of are in telecom and other utilities in which
governments have traditionally imposed a monopoly in order to protect us
from the dangers of a natural monopoly.
Chris
---
Chris Hibbert It is easy to turn an aquarium into fish soup, but
hibbert@netcom.com not so easy to turn fish soup back into an aquarium.
-- Lech Walesa on reverting to a market economy.
http://discuss.foresight.org/~hibbert/home.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 08:08:54 MST