Manhattan Buckeye;933105 wrote:"If you are a good competitor you attempt to out do them. Elimination is not the goal. "

Agree completely, I learned this lesson working as a lowly gas station clerk at a popular gas stop that had two other gas stations within a quarter of a mile.

Certainly our goal was to beat out the other two stations in revenue - we all charged the same rate per gallon, we earned customers by our non-fuel products and attractiveness to drivers that got off the main highway.

If the other two stations went under, I'm not sure the station I worked at would have gained much. More likely drivers would continue down the highway for another 10 miles and exit where there were more choices.

I know when I drove on the interstate, I never exited to fuel up unless it was a major hub. I'm sure many restaurants are similar. If you own a food court station at a mall, does it help you if a handful of so of previous food stations go belly up - probably not because it makes the mall look pathetic and there are fewer potential customers, making your market share irrelevant.

True, but then there are many markets where it isn't like that.

I Wear Pants;933896 wrote:True, but then there are many markets where it isn't like that.

You'd be surprised.

One of the easiest ways to market is by vilifying the competition. Hard to do without any.

O-Trap;933901 wrote:You'd be surprised.

One of the easiest ways to market is by vilifying the competition. Hard to do without any.

If Microsoft either bought or drove all the competitors in operating systems out of business it isn't like people would stop buying computers.

Things that depend on there being people around (retail stores, restaurants, etc) benefit from there being nearby competition because it brings potential customers to the area. However things like tech and software services don't really have that problem/benefit (depending on how one looks at it).

I Wear Pants;933926 wrote:If Microsoft either bought or drove all the competitors in operating systems out of business it isn't like people would stop buying computers.

Correct. However, with size comes a need to maintain margins. Shortcuts are easier to make since you have no competition. That will breed resentment among the buying public.

That becomes a breeding ground for new competition.

I Wear Pants;933926 wrote:Things that depend on there being people around (retail stores, restaurants, etc) benefit from there being nearby competition because it brings potential customers to the area. However things like tech and software services don't really have that problem/benefit (depending on how one looks at it).

Correct. Those have their own reasons for competition.

O-Trap;933934 wrote:Correct. However, with size comes a need to maintain margins. Shortcuts are easier to make since you have no competition. That will breed resentment among the buying public.

That becomes a breeding ground for new competition.



Correct. Those have their own reasons for competition.

In our purely hypothetical absolute free market I'd argue that should Microsoft buy/crush all it's competitors that even if it fucks up and a new company is generated they'll be so large as to be able to either buy it or crush it through various methods.

It's not the competition that's bad, competition is great. It's that in a real free market it's easy for a company to overtake all it's competitors.

Ignoring how the number of products and companies increases demand, supply at a given price will normally (in the real world) be about the same with 1 as with 5. The monopoly will extract a bit more consumer rent because of size efficiencies, but normally they aren't gouging and what is hurt is innovation.

Clearly a problem back in Adam Smith's day, and even the 'ol Rockefeller's and Andrew Carnegie's, but there is a lot more global competition these days for the "free market" to work a lot more as expected in theory, especially given the increasing number of competing substitutes and alternatives in many cases.

Outisde of commodities, I don't know. Apple was headed toward a monopoly in smartphones (though realistically that market is still years away from maturity), then almost overnight Android has doubled Apple's share.

The majority of industries seem to be dominated by a small number of players, or 1-2 large players and a bunch of tiny ones. You can say that's all you need for healthy competition, but you aren't very far from monopoly and in most cases you would characterize things as oligopoly's. Heck, look at Android and IOS - essentially a duopoly.

I Wear Pants;934030 wrote:In our purely hypothetical absolute free market I'd argue that should Microsoft buy/crush all it's competitors that even if it fucks up and a new company is generated they'll be so large as to be able to either buy it or crush it through various methods.

Buying only works if the owner sells, and there have been too many examples where the biggest dog's apathy (combined with time) brings its downfall at the expense of a little dog.

I remember, for example, when Yahoo! was essentially the undisputed corner of the search engine market. Sure, it wasn't a true monopoly, because you had the little Dogpile and AskJeeves and MSN. However, at the time, this cheap little search engine site was started by an internet geek and a couple people with solid marketing knowledge. We call it Google today.

Yahoo!, while again not a true monopoly, had about as little to fear from Google as a true monopoly would.

I Wear Pants;934030 wrote: It's not the competition that's bad, competition is great. It's that in a real free market it's easy for a company to overtake all it's competitors.

The perpetual entrepreneurial spirit of people, combined with a profitable opportunity like the one above, will keep a company from ever actually having no competition.

I Wear Pants;933078 wrote:If you're a good competitor you attempt to eliminate your competition. Which is what happens when corporations grow too big unchecked. Ma Bell, Microsoft in the 90s, etc.

Wrong. This isn't a sporting event. Your goal is profit. Sure you don't want your competitors to do well, but you don't have time to think up ways to eliminate a competitor.

iclfan2;934365 wrote:Wrong. This isn't a sporting event. Your goal is profit. Sure you don't want your competitors to do well, but you don't have time to think up ways to eliminate a competitor.

Um, Ma Bell, Microsoft in the 90s, etc.

I Wear Pants;934586 wrote:Um, Ma Bell, Microsoft in the 90s, etc.

Elimination can be a biproduct, sure.

Those were instances of companies who took deliberate steps to eliminate competition. It wasn't a byproduct of them simply trying to operate and make a profit.

I Wear Pants;934586 wrote:Um, Ma Bell, Microsoft in the 90s, etc.

Of course it happens, but you made it sound like each company is out to eliminate all of their competitors when that is not the case.

I Wear Pants;934586 wrote:Um, Ma Bell, Microsoft in the 90s, etc.

I am not going to get into the detail of these businesses per se.

Here is my basic philosophy concerning the free market. The free market should be free of government involvement as long as the consumer/taxpayer are not unjustly put at risk.

To keep it simple the consumer/taxpayer is put at risk in two basic ways:

A business that gains so large a share of the market that it can name its price. For instance a business gains such a share of the milk market that it can force consumers to pay $10/gallon for milk. You get your milk from us or you do without milk. Textbook Monopoly.

A business that gains so large a share of the market that it can drive prices low. Because of it buying power and centralization of overhead costs and lets not leave out taxpayer subsidies. Keeping with the milk business as an example the consumer is happy because he is getting his milk at $2/gallon. Lack of competition and taxpayer subsidies promotes bad business practices. The economy takes a downturn and said milk business begins to collapse. Fearing $15/gallon milk prices the government steps in and puts the taxpayers on the lamb. Of course to protect the taxpayer and the consumer.

IMO governments should get involved and break these entities up before they damage the free market. Its a harder call with my second point. But I can err on the side of caution and prematurely break up companies that if they would fail would collapse the economy, than later bail them out on the taxpayers dime. Breaking up of companies does not necessitate government power. In these cases it diminishes it. The government is refusing to protect their unjust share of the market. Instead protect the interests of the consumer and taxpayer.

A business can have 100% of a market and still not necessarily be able to name it's price - the elasticity of demand matters. Even if they can, it still may not warrant govt action, ignoring the loss of consumer surplus due to lack of innovation. But to the extent consumers can and would choose substitutes, the harm done is debateable. An example I could use would be the IPad - Apple could have 100% of that market and do whatever they want and charge whatever they want, but consumers could substitute laptops/netbooks or smartphones, or even choose alternate forms of entertainment such as tv, etc.. I'd argue there'd be no real need to break up the IPad tablet monopoly. But your milk example is a good one where you would take action.

The 3rd quarter fundraising numbers are in. Here are the donations by active duty military.

Ron Paul $75,201
Barack Obama $39,828
Rick Perry $7,325
Mitt Romney $6,555
Michelle Bachmann $4,632
Herman Cain $3,295
Rick Santorum $500
Newt Gingrich $250

Cleveland Buck;935393 wrote:The 3rd quarter fundraising numbers are in. Here are the donations by active duty military.

Ron Paul $75,201
Barack Obama $39,828
Rick Perry $7,325
Mitt Romney $6,555
Michelle Bachmann $4,632
Herman Cain $3,295
Rick Santorum $500
Newt Gingrich $250

Links are cool. We like them.

http://query.nictusa.com/pres/2011/Q3/

Someone on another board added them up from the FEC's website. It looks about the same as it did last quarter, so I'm not going to double check it.

majorspark;935186 wrote:I am not going to get into the detail of these businesses per se.

Here is my basic philosophy concerning the free market. The free market should be free of government involvement as long as the consumer/taxpayer are not unjustly put at risk.

To keep it simple the consumer/taxpayer is put at risk in two basic ways:

A business that gains so large a share of the market that it can name its price. For instance a business gains such a share of the milk market that it can force consumers to pay $10/gallon for milk. You get your milk from us or you do without milk. Textbook Monopoly.

A business that gains so large a share of the market that it can drive prices low. Because of it buying power and centralization of overhead costs and lets not leave out taxpayer subsidies. Keeping with the milk business as an example the consumer is happy because he is getting his milk at $2/gallon. Lack of competition and taxpayer subsidies promotes bad business practices. The economy takes a downturn and said milk business begins to collapse. Fearing $15/gallon milk prices the government steps in and puts the taxpayers on the lamb. Of course to protect the taxpayer and the consumer.

IMO governments should get involved and break these entities up before they damage the free market. Its a harder call with my second point. But I can err on the side of caution and prematurely break up companies that if they would fail would collapse the economy, than later bail them out on the taxpayers dime. Breaking up of companies does not necessitate government power. In these cases it diminishes it. The government is refusing to protect their unjust share of the market. Instead protect the interests of the consumer and taxpayer.

Didn't read anything I disagree with here.

gut;935189 wrote:A business can have 100% of a market and still not necessarily be able to name it's price - the elasticity of demand matters. Even if they can, it still may not warrant govt action, ignoring the loss of consumer surplus due to lack of innovation. But to the extent consumers can and would choose substitutes, the harm done is debateable. An example I could use would be the IPad - Apple could have 100% of that market and do whatever they want and charge whatever they want, but consumers could substitute laptops/netbooks or smartphones, or even choose alternate forms of entertainment such as tv, etc.. I'd argue there'd be no real need to break up the IPad tablet monopoly. But your milk example is a good one where you would take action.

The availability of substitutes is certainly an important consideration as to whether or not a company is or is in a situation to abuse it's dominant position.

I Wear Pants;936262 wrote:The availability of substitutes is certainly an important consideration as to whether or not a company is or is in a situation to abuse it's dominant position.

Off the top of my head, outside of utilities and commodities, I can't think of many industries that don't have close substitutes to mitigate monopoly regulation. I'm sure we can think of more, but those are the only two coming immediately to mind.

Although I would agree that monopolies tend to under-invest, so it would be pro-growth to break them up. Again, not even considering how monopolies stifle innovation.

gut;936285 wrote:Off the top of my head, outside of utilities and commodities, I can't think of many industries that don't have close substitutes to mitigate monopoly regulation. I'm sure we can think of more, but those are the only two coming immediately to mind.

Although I would agree that monopolies tend to under-invest, so it would be pro-growth to break them up. Again, not even considering how monopolies stifle innovation.

I think that beyond the simple "are there substitutes available" test I think another important thing is to analyze the tactics being employed by the company to maintain it's position. Again using Microsoft in the 90s as an example. Sure there were other options available but Microsoft was deliberate in it's attempts to weaken it's competition. Which is why I think action against them by government was appropriate.

And you're right about utilities and commodities being the most at risk industries for this type of thing. Though hopefully we start to consider the internet as a utility. Because it is now.

Ron Paul's Plan to Restore America was unveiled today with shockingly little fanfare in the media. The basics:

Cut $1 trillion from the budget in year 1, balance the budget by year 3.

Only cuts war spending from the defense budget, so still spends $500 billion on defense.

Ends the wars and brings the troops home.

Eliminates Dept. of Education (does keep Pell grants and shifts them to another dept.), Dept. of Energy, Dept. of Commerce, Dept. of Interior, Dept. of Housing and Urban Development.

Eliminates all subsidies and corporate welfare.

Eliminates all foreign aid.

Repeal Obamacare, Dodd-Frank, Sarbanes-Oxley, and regulations mandated by executive order.

Keeps Social Security, Medicare, and Veterans services at current levels while offering young people the option to opt out of the system.

Block grants Medicaid, Child Health Care, and other welfare programs to the states.

Keep Bush tax cuts (for now, eventually wants to eliminate the income tax), 15% corporate tax, 0% capital gains and dividends tax, 0% estate tax, 0% on repatriated funds from overseas.

Push legislation legalizing competing currencies to strengthen the dollar and control inflation and for a full audit of the Federal Reserve.

http://c3244172.r72.cf0.rackcdn.com/...mericaPlan.pdf

I agree with all this. Except on the foreign aid issue. Paul would have to find away to reduce foreign aid in a manner that does not cost us more than it will save. Just pulling the plug on all of it will cause a whirlpool of shit. I still don't believe we can just stay out of everything. It would be open season for the Russians and the Chinese.

Paul is going to have to find a way to get his message across. Its not the media. In my opinion that 9/11 comment a few debates back really hurt him. He seemed to have some momentum. Perry sucked and everyone went to Cain.

Are we still afraid of the communists? Really? In 2011?

The American people are tragically retarded if that 9/11 comment really hurt Paul. (Insert: "Herp derp we already know this because they voted for Obama!" comment).

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