Antitrust and Monopolies

If you look throughout history the only monopolies that exist are those granted by the government. Sure standard oil captures a huge chunk of the market (by lowering prices over 90%), but they lose that advantage, by the time antitrust action was taken against them it had already lost a large chunk of its market. Antitrust law was originally passed because of the government involvement in the train industry.Also, regulation increased under bush and so did oversight. We currently have the m

Yes, what GP said is true, at least since the 80s. Before that, too powerful monopolies were considered bad for society; that's why Standard Oil was broken up. However, understanding of US antitrust law underwent a shift in the 80s - now a monopoly has to actively hurt the end consumer for it to be prosecuted under the Sherman antitrust act.

When Standard Oil was broken up, it wasn't a 100% monopoly. Nor was AT&T. I'm not sure what your criteria are, but if you're just being pedantic, it doesn't seem to have any historical bearing. The great monopolies of US history that prompted legal change never had complete control. They just had de facto control due to outsized influence and predatory (or at least anticompetitive) behavior.

The same antitrust law that dictated breaking up AT&T and Standard Oil (among others): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_antitrust_law#Mo...

LOL. What will that change? Look back into history of Standard Oil and other monopolists. They were formally split, sure, but nothing did change.

You don't seem to be reading what I've written three times now. Perhaps you aren't aware of antitrust law, its purpose, and relevant cases: you might not know about how AT&T ("Ma Bell") was broken up using antitrust law, or how Microsoft was found guilty of abusing its monopoly position by bundling Internet Explorer. Standard Oil was the impetus for the legislation - that's a good one to learn about.More recently, businesses have created duopolies of convenie

The US has a history of breaking up monopolies. Think of Standard Oil or Bell breakup. Usually when they react they react late, but when they do it, they make sure they don't have to come back again, as in they are very thorough with their breakup.

Standard Oil, AT&T and Microsoft can all be beaten -- just as soon as the government steps in and takes action against them. Capital tends to concentrate over time. It takes government action to break up monopolies. There are very few examples of monopolies fading away on their own.

The US used to have fairly strong antitrust enforcement.Here is an excerpt from [0]."To get a flavor of how thoroughly the federal government managed competition throughout the economy in the 1960s, consider the case of Brown Shoe Co., Inc. v. United States, in which the Supreme Court blocked a merger that would have given a single distributor a mere 2 percent share of the national shoe market."[0] <a href="http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/novdec-2015&

The problem is that Government hasn't enforced Anti-Trust Laws since 1970. Things are more deregulated but the only companies that can compete are already part of the Fascist state. Do you remember when you had more than 10 choices for Internet? Breaking up monopolies should be a primary function of the US Government. Now it encourages them.