America Has a Monopoly Problem

Summary of 2017 article by Joseph Stiglitz on concentrated corporate power in America

The Bosses of the Sentate, political cartoon, 1889

For me the problem with monopolies is seeing the same shopping mall with a Starbucks, CVS and Walmart wherever you drive in America. An economy run by billionaires and monopolists is boring. Stiglitz begins his piece by describing this sad state of affairs in America today. It’s kind of a bummer but follows with concrete ideas about solutions. Keep calm and read on 🤙

There is a widespread sense of powerlessness, both in our economic and political life. We seem no longer to control our own destinies. If we don’t like our Internet company or our cable TV, we either have no place to turn, or the alternative is no better. Monopoly corporations are the primary reason that drug prices in the United States are higher than anywhere else in the world. Whether we like it or not, a company like Equifax can gather data about us, and then blithely take insufficient cybersecurity measures, exposing…