I myself lost my high paying tech job that isn't coming back. When I get a quick bite to eat at McDonalds I see these gig work people.
Then I think, what happens when all the other remote tech workers in my area that refuse to drive to McDonalds also lose their jobs? The gig workers also lose their income.
Maybe globalization was an aberration, enabled by low cost labor that is evaporating due to structural demographics. The world is aging, corporations are demanding profit levels that are potentially becoming unrealistic and unsustainable in the forward looking macro. A call for distributed self sufficiency for non discretionary needs imho (energy, housing, food, etc). They cannot take away what you don’t need. Perhaps I’m calling the Solarpunk era a bit too soon though. Cheap energy and automation are the future.
I think late stage capitalism might be here. I think we can pull it back, but one thing that might need to happen is get to a point where mergers/acquisitions are extremely hard to do or impossible.
If we had thousands of smaller companies that find and fill their niche, they can adapt quickly to change and keep prices low because they are constantly competing with 30 other companies.
As soon as you allow for a mega corp to gobble up 40% of the market, you find out quickly that another 40% is at dinner with them deciding on next years prices together.
Two years in a row now I walked into ABC Supply (a roofing supply company). They printed out letters from Malarkey, GAF, Owens Corning and a few others and taped them up on a board. The words are almost identical in stating that this year on April 1 they will have a price increase between 7 and 10 percent.
Keep in mind that NONE of these companies are depending on Chinese materials, and share no parent company. But together they own 100% of the local market. Their prices are within $5 a square of each other. No matter which roof you chose, you're paying the same price.
The people at ABC are sick of my joke I always tell them: "I guess price fixing is no longer illegal!"
I'll try to get a picture of this board on Monday and post it here.
Yeah we’ve barely prevented outright monopoly in many industries, but instead allowed oligopoly to flourish. They don’t have to outright shake hands and say let’s all raise prices, but just have one raise prices and the others follow suit. This kind of gouging is far from new but seems to have dramatically accelerated in recent years.
I myself lost my high paying tech job that isn't coming back. When I get a quick bite to eat at McDonalds I see these gig work people.
Then I think, what happens when all the other remote tech workers in my area that refuse to drive to McDonalds also lose their jobs? The gig workers also lose their income.
Yeah the chain reaction is going to hit everybody. Even if your survival isn't threatened, things are going to become a lot more inconvenient.
Maybe globalization was an aberration, enabled by low cost labor that is evaporating due to structural demographics. The world is aging, corporations are demanding profit levels that are potentially becoming unrealistic and unsustainable in the forward looking macro. A call for distributed self sufficiency for non discretionary needs imho (energy, housing, food, etc). They cannot take away what you don’t need. Perhaps I’m calling the Solarpunk era a bit too soon though. Cheap energy and automation are the future.
I think late stage capitalism might be here. I think we can pull it back, but one thing that might need to happen is get to a point where mergers/acquisitions are extremely hard to do or impossible.
If we had thousands of smaller companies that find and fill their niche, they can adapt quickly to change and keep prices low because they are constantly competing with 30 other companies.
As soon as you allow for a mega corp to gobble up 40% of the market, you find out quickly that another 40% is at dinner with them deciding on next years prices together.
Two years in a row now I walked into ABC Supply (a roofing supply company). They printed out letters from Malarkey, GAF, Owens Corning and a few others and taped them up on a board. The words are almost identical in stating that this year on April 1 they will have a price increase between 7 and 10 percent.
Keep in mind that NONE of these companies are depending on Chinese materials, and share no parent company. But together they own 100% of the local market. Their prices are within $5 a square of each other. No matter which roof you chose, you're paying the same price.
The people at ABC are sick of my joke I always tell them: "I guess price fixing is no longer illegal!"
I'll try to get a picture of this board on Monday and post it here.
Yeah we’ve barely prevented outright monopoly in many industries, but instead allowed oligopoly to flourish. They don’t have to outright shake hands and say let’s all raise prices, but just have one raise prices and the others follow suit. This kind of gouging is far from new but seems to have dramatically accelerated in recent years.
What can we do to specifically stop it? People have had enough and will Luigi over it.
https://ilsr.org/fighting-monopoly-power/
https://ilsr.org/fighting-monopoly-power/why-it-matters/
thank you for this!