O Mito do Capitalismo: Monopólios e a Morte da Concorrência

by Jonathan Tepper, Denise Hearn (co-author)

Nas últimas décadas, passámos de um mercado livre e competitivo para uma economia em que poucas empresas dominam indústrias-chave. Vivemos na ilusão da escolha, mas, para a maioria das decisões cruciais, como a internet de alta velocidade, os seguros de saúde, as redes sociais ou até os bens de consumo, contamos apenas com uma ou duas empresas.

Diariamente, os trabalhadores transferem um pouco do seu salário para monopólios e oligopólios que não cessam de crescer. A solução para esta tragédia é a aplicação de legislação de concorrência rigorosa que devolva aos mercados a competitividade que gera crescimento económico, postos de trabalho, melhores salários e igualdade de condições para todos.

Numa sociedade cada vez mais desigual, com um crescimento económico anémico e os trabalhadores envolvidos numa guerra de poder desigual, O Mito do Capitalismo é um livro fundamental para compreender os riscos de uma economia dominada pela minoria.

Genres: Economics, Nonfiction, Business, Politics, Finance, History, Sociology

297 pages, Paperback

First published November 20, 2018

About the author

I am the Chief Investment Officer of Prevatt Capital, an asset manager that makes deeply-researched investments in quality companies with a fundamental value-driven approach.

Previously, I founded Variant Perception, a company that provides investment research to asset managers. I started my investing career as an equity analyst at SAC Capital and then as a Vice President in proprietary trading at Bank of America. Along the way, with my friend and partner Turi Munthe, we founded Demotix, a citizen-journalism website and photo agency. We sold Demotix in 2012 to Corbis, a company owned then by Bill Gates.

I earned a BA with Highest Honors in History and Honors in Economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After receiving a Rhodes Scholarship, I earned a M.Litt. in Modern History from the University of Oxford.

I wrote Shooting Up: A Memoir, which will be published in February 2026. I grew up in Madrid in the 1980s, and my parents started a drug rehab among heroin addicts. Almost all had shared needles and were HIV+. They became my older brothers and sisters, and many died of AIDS. The book is a story of love and loss, but it is also a love letter to friends, family, and even learning.

Reviews

[Athan Tolis · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a story that’s crying to be told.

For three important reasons, this is not the book that tells it.

First, it’s poorly written: no editor’s been within a mile of it; the authors repeat entire paragraphs verbatim! (example: second paragraph of p. 98 and first paragraph of p. 118). If that is because they’ve strung together a bunch of articles they wrote earlier, they have a duty to tell us that upfront and a duty to do some editing, so I don’t read about the airlines six times. Seriously!

Second, anything I know intimately that’s covered in here is sloppy. Gensler gets thrown under the bus (chart, p. 190) as an ex-Goldman guy, when he did stellar work at the CFTC. The coverage of Germany in the thirties would make Adam Tooze freak out. And some of the biggest total monopolies (chewing gum, styrofoam cups) go unmentioned. How can I trust the bits I’m learning about for the first time?

Third, monopoly does not happen just like that. While I agree wholeheartedly with the authors that market power is 100% what elected Trump (even if his voters don’t realize it), and therefore that monopoly and oligopoly are the biggest enemy of our polity, the author does not seem to understand that specific laws made it possible and therefore those are the laws we need to repeal.

But perhaps that’s the problem. When they’re not writing books, the authors, wait for it, advise hedge funds. Unlikely then that they’d mention, dunno, the carried interest exemption, eh? So they don’t . Their list of things to fix is almost as pathetic as their fixation with economics and economists… At least they don’t blame the Russians, that’s nice.

So I’m very sad to report that this isn’t the book I was hoping it would be. In the meantime, I can re-read Barry Lynn’s “Cornered,” which at least motivates the problem much better from a political standpoint and, of course, I can re-read the absolute daddy of angry, unreadable, unedited books, the one and (thank God) only “Great Deformation,” where between paeans to Eisenhower and a scarily misguided indictment of government, David Stockman forensically lays out the tools he used when he attempted to create his own private car parts monopoly prior to the 2008 crisis. He calls it “corporate equity withdrawal” and it’s all explained between pages 404 and 576, where he sets up the threefold source of our problem, namely:

1. The tax deductibility of the cost of servicing debt

2. The lower tax rate on passive income

3. The Fed ‘s “dual mandate” having been hijacked to protect risky asset holders via low rates

Credit where credit is due, the authors of “The Myth of Capitalism” do add to this, actually: the fact that three indexers essentially control the board on all listed US entities certainly must tilt the playing field toward both distributions and toward monopoly-creating mergers, and away from investment in people, R&D, plant and equipment.

At least three of these four things are different now than they were forty years ago, and that’s what we need to break. By the time you’re breaking monopolies, it’s far too late. It’s as futile as the taxes Piketty proposes (and the authors correctly pan.)

Meantime, I’m still waiting for a sober, non-repeating, thorough book that deals with the issues in a level-headed, methodical, analytical way and proposes real solutions, as opposed to “buy more copies of this book for your friends.”

“So what’s with the three stars, then, Athan?”

Big points for daring to criticize the big tech behemoths, nobody dares do that anymore!

[Charles Haywood · Rating 4 out of 5]

The death of the free market at the hands of monopoly has gotten a lot of recent attention. By far the best book about this problem is Tim Wu’s "The Curse of Bigness," which through a “neo-Brandeisian” lens focuses on how monopoly destroys the core frameworks of a free society. This book, "The Myth of Capitalism," comes to much the same conclusion from a more visceral starting place—why have wages stagnated even though the labor market is tight and corporate profits are soaring? The answer is corporate concentration, and Jonathan Tepper is, like Wu, offering concrete solutions.

The problems that monopoly causes are not disputed in any relevant way by anyone but a few University of Chicago ideologues. The difficulty is that all possible solutions are opposed by the ultra-powerful, ranked in armed array. One traditional way of dealing with such concentrations of power is populism, of the Left or Right. On a good day, we get Theodore Roosevelt; on a bad day, someone less attractive. It is therefore no surprise we see populist realignments arising across the political spectrum, with both conservatives and liberals girding for battle against the neoliberal kingmakers who dominate the Republican and Democratic parties. The question is whether the populists have enough will to start, then finish, the fight. As Warren Zevon sang, “Some have the speed and the right combinations / If you can’t take the punches, it don’t mean a thing.”

If the new populists, the neo-Brandeisians, do have the will, this book offers some tools. It is less cerebral than Wu’s, aimed at people who have to be told who Leon Trotsky was (“a Marxist revolutionary,” if you’re curious). Tepper’s basic point is that we no longer have the free market (what he incorrectly calls “capitalism”), because most industries no longer have relevant competition. It is not because of monopoly, which is usually very obvious, but rather the less noticeable oligopoly, where a handful of firms dominate but competition, to a casual observer, appears to exist. The inevitable result of oligopoly, as Tepper (along with what appears to be some kind of co-author, Denise Hearn) shows and nobody who lives in the real world doubts, is tacit collusion on all fronts, pricing and otherwise, to avoid competition. In an oligopoly collusion is nearly as certain as death and taxes, even if done without any formal agreement.

Tepper demonstrates in several compelling ways that competition is dying. Mergers have reduced the number of firms in almost all industries, while antitrust enforcement has declined over the past four decades to nearly nothing. Since 1995, the word “competition” has declined by 75% in annual reports to shareholders of public companies. Tepper offers a variety of technical measures to demonstrate his point, and I don’t think anyone disputes this. (If anyone does, I’ve missed it.) He then lists an astonishing number of industries that are nearly totally consolidated (although someone should tell him that Purdue is the university and Perdue is the chicken company). Airlines and cable TV, obviously, but also beer, bacon (all those different brands in the store are owned by Smithfield), milk, eyeglasses, drug wholesalers, crop agriculture, and very much more.

Why is collusion to avoid competition bad? Tepper believes that oligopoly is literally destroying the country, and he’s pretty much right (though a lot of other unrelated things are simultaneously destroying the country). Obviously, everyone pays higher prices. But higher prices are the least of collusion’s evils. The most evident problem for most people is that oligopolies, in Tepper’s words, killed your paycheck. Stagnant wages, the problem that sparked the writing of this book, lead to higher inequality, social tension, and societal destruction. And a big cause of stagnant wages is corporate concentration, which directly lowers wages for workers, since oligopolies act as monopsonies (buyer price-setters) in the labor market, especially in smaller labor markets. It is not an answer to say that workers should go where the jobs are. The wages are often no higher there, and people are loathe to leave their communities and people, as they should be. (This is one of the key points of J. D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy.)

It’s not just monopsony. Tepper also focuses on a particular burr that chafes me, non-compete agreements. These have exploded, and are commonly found now even in burger-flipping jobs. They are an abomination. (None of my employees, in any position, has to sign a non-competition agreement, on principle. I don’t care if my employees compete with me. Of course, I’m so wonderful to work for that nobody would ever quit.) Non-competition agreements are an offense against God and man, and it is not a coincidence that California has, for 150 years, forbidden them and developed Silicon Valley as a result. That rule should be extended nationwide, immediately, federalism be damned.

Beyond wage stagnation, lack of competition leads to lack of innovation. Again, this is a commonplace, known when the Sherman Act was passed (in 1890), but conveniently forgotten when the money flows to the right political pockets. Less competition means less investment in winning competitions. Oligopoly also means that startups can be bought out with offers they can’t refuse, not dissimilar to Pablo Escobar’s famous demand to choose “plata o plomo.” And aside from buyouts, startups suffer direct attacks made possibly by the disproportionate power of oligopolists, such as Google’s suppression of, or theft of the data of, any type of business that might compete (not just in search, but in any type of data that Google thinks it can monetize).

Occasionally one hears the halfhearted response that we have monopoly or oligopoly because big companies provide what consumers want and do a better, more efficient job. Tepper, like Wu, sneers at this explanation. The reality is that most giant companies are actually less efficient; there is such a thing as diseconomies of scale. Even back in the day, when Standard Oil was forcibly dismembered, the pieces collectively were more valuable than the monopoly. Again, nobody with any sense defends oligopoly; they just dodge or ignore attacks, and laugh all the way to the bank (Jamie Dimon’s bank, or another one of the oligopolist banks). Covering all the bases, Tepper also criticizes common ownership cutting across publicly traded firms, noting that index fund investing has exacerbated the problem, since entities like Fidelity have large stakes in nearly every company, including those that are putatively competitors. He touches on the problems with CEO pay, too, which are covered in more detail in Steven Clifford’s "The CEO Pay Machine," suggesting better alignment of incentives through workers being granted shares, restrictions on stock buybacks, and lockups on manager-held shares.

Government actively assists the process of oligopoly formation, and not just by failing to enforce the antitrust laws. Enforcement of those laws is corrupted by the ideology of Robert Bork and by highly compensated economists who spin fantasies of future consumer price reductions that never arrive. On those rare occasions when the government attempts to enforce the laws, the courts side with the oligopolists (as in today’s decision by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, rejecting the Trump administration’s attempt to block Time Warner’s merger with AT&T, where, bizarrely, the burden of proof appears to have been put on the government). For another example, Congress forbids the sale of insurance across state lines, effectively creating oligopolies; Obamacare, largely written by insurance companies, did not change that at all. And Congress, along with administrative agencies, eagerly obeys the commands of oligopolists to increase regulation. That may seem odd, until you realize what many people miss, that big companies always favor any regulation that falls harder on smaller companies, both due to compliance costs and as barriers to entry, and moreover they often write the laws and rules specifically to favor themselves. The classic example of this is Mattel, when found importing toys contaminated with lead paint, got a law passed that required expensive third-party lead testing for all toy sellers—except for themselves, who were allowed to do it cheaply internally. Or, to take another example, what penalty did Equifax pay for massively exposing consumer data due to incompetence? None, because if you’re big enough and spread enough gold around, the regulations don’t really apply to you.

Government action is even worse and has greater impact than it appears, because beyond simple inefficiency and inequality, many of these oligopolies now themselves exercise the powers of government. Tepper offers Progressive economist Robert Lee Hale’s definition of government: “There is government whenever one person or group can tell others what they must do and when those others have to obey or suffer a penalty.” By that token, certainly, all the Lords of Tech, from Google to Facebook to Amazon, are government, as are, in their own spheres, all the other consolidated industries. (And, of course, often these companies impose penalties on those who do not toe the line on their political ideologies; it is not just business penalties that are at issue.) We are not that far off the classic science fiction dystopia where corporations are the government, and can impose their will on all sectors of society.

If everyone not in the pocket of oligopolists agrees that corporate concentration is a problem, why isn’t anything being done about it? Silly rabbit, it’s because all the money and power is on the side of the oligopolies. All these companies spend huge sums lobbying, and it’s been shown they get massive returns on the dollars spent. They lobby to prevent antitrust enforcement; Google was the second-biggest source of campaign contributions to Obama. They lobby to add regulations. But it’s also the revolving door, at every agency and every level of government, that means oligopolists get what they want. Google, a particular target of Tepper, is one of the biggest offenders, with hundreds of its employees shuttling back and forth into and out of the government, collecting money and power both coming and going.

So far, so bad. These companies also use their power in perniciously creative ways, some of which Tepper does not mention. For example, it is well known that Amazon is the major source of income for many smaller businesses (and plenty of larger ones) that sell on its platform, and uses the data it obtains about such sales to benefit itself and eliminate the profits for those businesses, increasing its own monopoly power. I don’t sell through Amazon; I’m a contract manufacturer, and thus invisible to Amazon. But one day last year an Amazon functionary called me up. They asked us to develop a brand in our industry (in essence, food, which we put into containers) which would be sold on Amazon. We could set the prices; the proposed deal was that we’d both profit if we developed an attractive brand, since Amazon would push it and we’d make money on the sales.

I figured this was a scam, since I am cynical and think Jeff Bezos should be put in a ducking chair, but set up a conference call anyway with a team of Amazonians. After buttering me up, they glibly mentioned in passing that, among other standard boilerplate in the agreements they’d send me to sign, which were of course trivial (but not negotiable), there was an unimportant standard provision: that at any point Amazon could buy this entire new brand from me, lock, stock, and barrel, for the lesser of $10,000 or fees actually paid to lawyers to register trademarks. But, they assured me, this was just so they could “help me if there were any legal challenges.” A total lie, of course. What they were, and are, doing is suckering people who, unlike me, are not former M&A lawyers, by, at no cost to Amazon, throwing up hundreds or thousands of brands; seeing which succeed; then stealing them from their creators, who eagerly sign documents without paying any attention, hoping to hit the big time. A small thing, perhaps, but indicative of a cheater’s mentality. Fifty lashes for Jeff Bezos at the whipping post in the town square!

Tepper offers a long list of excellent solutions. Vastly more aggressive antitrust enforcement, using bright-line numerical rules about corporate concentration. Slowing down the revolving door. Common carriage rules for internet platforms that sell third-party services (not only Net Neutrality, presumably, but also other services, such as Amazon’s selling platform). Creating rules that reduce switching costs, such as portability of social media data. All these are good, though I’d go farther. For internet common carriers, I would include rules that forbid viewpoint discrimination. I’d break up all major tech companies, and probably break up almost all existing corporate concentrations. I’d totally forbid the revolving door. Regardless, I find nothing deficient in Tepper’s solutions.

But these are all egghead solutions from eggheads, vaporware in the ether. Billions of dollars are being raked in by the powerful, and then distributed to protect their interests. The oligopolists will never accept a single one of these solutions. Tepper works as an advisor to hedge funds (it is no surprise that those particular concentrations of power, which are also extremely pernicious and often eagerly participate in creating and extending the problems identified in this book, receive a grand total of zero attacks in this book). He is lucky he does not work for a think tank or other vulnerable entity. Google, for example, brutalized Anne-Marie Slaughter’s New America Foundation in 2017 when it dared to have on staff an academic team who suggested that more antitrust enforcement against Google might be a good idea. Attacking the oligopolists is like chasing a demonic greased pig—even if you catch him, he’ll probably wriggle out of your grasp, and if he can’t, he’ll kill you.

What’s the answer, other than pitchforks? (I’m all for the pitchforks.) Well, divide and conquer, probably. We should serially use Saul Alinsky’s Rule 13: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” This will probably have to be done at the intersection of two other unpredictable factors. First, some especially spectacular bad behavior by a target, which implies that the each sequential target will have to first identify itself. Second, action by ambitious politicians, probably of the Left but maybe of the Right, willing to use this as a signature issue. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez may be an economic illiterate, but she’s ambitious and self-promoting enough to take on such a task, and tough enough to ignore the pressure and attacks from the oligopolists. Bernie Sanders maybe, too, but he’s so old his heart probably can’t take the punches. This is a task for the young. On the Right, I can’t think of anyone—Trump, of course, but he lacks the discipline and has shown a disinclination to actually act populist (thanks, Jared and Ivanka!) Marco Rubio and Mitt Romney aren’t going to do it. Maybe J. D. Vance, if he ever runs for office, but he strikes me as not nearly vicious or ambitious enough. But with any luck, the problems themselves will call forth the problem solvers. History shows us that for every action, a reaction—though, unfortunately, often one with unintended side effects. Within reason, though, I’d happily risk the side effects to destroy the oligopolists.

[Justus · Rating 2 out of 5]

Even though I agree with nearly all of the author's arguments, this is a terrible book and you shouldn't read it. It is poorly edited, all over the place, and includes numerous ridiculous, eye-rolling claims. It isn't entirely without merit -- the authors start with a good central claim -- but it spirals out of control and quickly turn into railing against all of the misdeeds of corporations & billionaires in the modern world. Actually, one of the book's best uses is simply as an aggregation of all those complaints into a single volume. Another point in favor of this book is that, unlike many similar books, they authors actually include numerous detailed suggestions on how to remedy the problems. So it isn't just all about complaining.

The book's initial point is a good one: it feels like something is off about modern capitalism (especially in America) and there is a mounting body of evidence that concentration of companies may be the root cause. This isn't monopoly per se -- there may still be three or four players -- but the authors make credible cases for how these oligopolies can act in quasi-monopolistic ways even without explicit cartel behaviour.

I think the strongest point in the entire book is that while companies may not be national monopolies they can often be regional monopolies. For example, there may be 4 cable companies in America but each town only has 1. There may be 4 airlines in the country, but any given hub city will be dominated by a single one. Those are the obvious examples but the authors show that the pattern repeats in many industries.

They also point out how these local monopolies turn into monopsonies that help drive down (or contain) local wages. If there's only one airline in your town and you're a pilot, then it is difficult to negotiate a higher wage.

But in among these good points they often make ridiculous, eye-rolling claims & statements. The worst one in the book was when they mention that in 2007 & 2008 contractors at Google had yellow badges...and draw a parallel between that and the yellow Star of David that Jews during the Holocaust had to wear.....

Another example: "If we were being mean, we might compare promerger economists to paid prostitutes, but that would be grossly unfair to prostitutes."

Another example: "Outright censorship is not so outlandish. According to the New York Times, Mark Zuckerberg has been learning Chinese." (I think we're supposed to infer that he's turning into some kind of Manchurian Candidate for Chinese-style censorship in the US...and not just learning Chinese because his wife is Chinese & speaks it.)

Another example: "During an epic bout of Solitaire or porn at the Department of Justice, the great beer mergers slipped through the attention of antitrust authorities."

After enough examples like that it is hard not to feel like the authors let their passion get the better of their judgment.

The book is also quite poorly edited with numerous paragraphs that seem to have missed the editor's clarifying touch, leaving a reader trying to figure out what the authors meant. One brief example: "When after the English Civil war, the monopoly on printing remained." You can figure out what they mean but I don't think that's actually valid English.

In many cases the authors slide from valid points about industry concentration and just start railing against every aspect of modern capitalism that they don't like. In chapter 4 they talk about how 70% of workers are asked to sign non-compete agreements and binding arbitration agreements. I agree that both are bad but what does that have to do with industry concentration? They don't even try to make a case for a linkage between those practices and industry concentration. They often conflate monopsony with simply being a large employer. They complain that "In Ohio, Amazon is one of the state's major employers and 10% of Amazon workers are on food stamps." Again, I agree this isn't a great situation but what's the relationship between industry concentration, monopsony, and this. They also talk about occupational licensing but no one is going to try to pretend that cosmetologists's occupational licensing is due to some of industry concentration in the cosmetology industry. It's at this point that you realise the thread of the argument has spun totally out of control.

The authors often make take available evidence and abuse it to make unrelated claims. For instance, Apple has 80,000 employees. Apple also claims to be responsible for the creation of 2 million jobs on the US. The authors use those two claims as evidence that -- 80,000/2,000,000 = 4% -- "That means only a fraction of their workforce are full-time employees." But that's not what Apple is talking about. They're talking about how people found companies to build apps for iPhones. And they found companies to repair Apple laptops. They may or may not be full time employees but the claim is fundamentally about something different.

Likewise, they write

"In Seattle, home to two of the world's richest men -- Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos -- some companies can't be bothered to pay their employees minimum wage. SkyChefs, a company that puts together airplane food trays, was fined $335,000 in 2017 for violating Washington State's [...] minimum wage laws."

What on Earth do Bill Gates & Jeff Bezos have to do with SkyChefs? They're just slinging mud at the wall and hoping something sticks.

Or, "By 2016, regulations have expanded to 104.6 million words. The King James Bible comes in around 783,137 words." I don't see the relevance of comparing a 2,000 year old book to all of the laws required for a modern economy of 300+ million people to run.

Or, "And less than 14% of households directly own corporate stock." Why does this matter? What's wrong with holding it via a mutual fund or ETF?

This multitude of faults quick adds up and becomes tiresome. It is a shame because I think a tighter focus on the death of competition -- with some of the more dubious arguments (e.g. about index funds or complaints about how only the rich own stocks) stripped out by a more ruthless (and competent) editor -- would have resulted in a good entry on a much needed subject.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

An incredibly important book which highlights everything that I hate about capitalism. Much like communism, capitalism has many merits in theory but the implementation is another question entirely. What I admire about capitalism as a philosophy is that it is one of the few systems that has demonstrably been able to foster cooperation between fundamentally selfish individuals. The great irony is that success in the capitalist system sows the seeds for the destruction of the very same system, as large companies stifle competition in order to increase their own profits at the literal expense of the consumer. Tepper provides numerous examples of the monopolies/oligopolies that run the world – both the obvious ones, like Google search, as well as the hidden ones, like how EssilorLuxotica dominates the market for spectacles and sunglasses.

Perhaps where my view differs from that of the authors is the question of who is at fault. Tepper's anger is distributed across all the members of the system, but I believe that it is the regulators, not market participants, who must bear the lion's share of the blame. A capitalist is behaving perfectly rational when they seek to become a monopolist, as are investors who choose to allocate capital to those companies with the widest competitive moat. It is the role of the government to draw the line between selfish gains and direct harm to others; their consistent failure to do so is no fault of the investors (or even the companies – though this is definitely a more controversial view). "Don't hate the player, hate the game".

This book has cemented my view that the current implementation of capitalism in America (and to a lesser extent elsewhere) is broken. Corporate lobbying is a ridiculous system that provides a legal means by which companies can bribe politicians for concessions that cost the consumer. One of the most heinous examples (not in this book, but nicely covered in Michael Lewis' The Fifth Risk) is the story of AccuWeather, a service that takes weather data freely published by the US government and wraps it into a program which it sells to weather apps and news media. AccuWeather has subsequently lobbied to make it incredibly difficult for other participants to access this free source directly.

Some quotes I liked:

"Capitalism without competition is not capitalism."

"The Left attacks the grotesque capitalism we see today, as if that were the true manifestation of the essence of capitalism"

"Competition is the basis for evolution. An absence of competition means an absence of evolution, a failure to adapt to new conditions. It threatens our survival."

[David Dayen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jonathan Tepper is angry. He's tired of defending capitalism when its current iteration is indefensible. He's perturbed to see a system he's worked in and thrived in for so long go to pieces. And he saves the most scorn for those functionaries in economics and the law leading the nation down a path of ruin by destroying capitalism.

This isn't exactly my perspective. But sometimes it's good to have a denunciation of capitalism from someone inside the system who believes in its benefits. In The Myth of Capitalism, Tepper and his co-author Denise Hearn detail the death of competition and rise of monopolies that have upended everything economists teach are the beneficial side effects of capitalism - growing wages, equality of opportunity, and broad-based prosperity. Monopolies cut off these channels, through sitting on innovation, bargaining down wages, and leaving everyone with fewer alternatives to their dominance. Tepper started thinking about the book when he couldn't figure out how the economy could produce high growth and stagnant wages simultaneously. With their precise rendering of our age of monopoly, he and Hearn have found the answer.

There's plenty in here I've written about before, and plenty I expect to write about again. But at this moment in time, it's the best bill of particulars for why this era of corporate concentration is so dangerous and must end.

[Mehrsa · Rating 4 out of 5]

The diagnosis of the problem is spot on--capitalism needs anti-trust or else there is no competition. In one chapter, the authors talk about all the industries that are monopolized by one or two firms and it is stunning. The companies form cartels and fix prices and it's impossible for small companies to compete. The fix was not enough, in my view. They oppose wealth taxation of all kinds and want to rely solely on anti-trust. I think we need both to promote competition.

[Max ☭ · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'll just leave two direct quotes from this book to speak for the merit of this book. "Marx wanted the state to be the monopoly" and "the solution is more capitalism." However, I must mention that this book is quite critical of big corporations.

[Ardon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I suppose that having competition as one of the key defining features of capitalism makes sense; greater diversity begets more choices for consumers, and keeps prices somewhat lower. However, Tepper makes the case that we are seeing less and less competition, because of monopolies, which insidiously twist the markets to favour their own development. They cut off emerging competitors at the knees, before they even have a chance to take their first steps, and use political lobbying to get regulations in place that benefit them and make it harder for the new entrants into the market to stay there.

Tepper compares the behaviour of huge oligopolies (like the airlines) to mafia bosses, carving up territories between themselves to optimise their revenues. These oligopolies also engage in price signalling, where each company knows that if another company in the oligopoly raises its prices, they too should do the same. This sort of tacit collusion really made me frustrated with the current state of capitalism.

The extent to which big companies can lobby in most countries to influence regulations that may affect their industries is honestly quite sickening, it doesn't seem very far off from bribery to me.

However, it has to be admitted that what these companies are doing is somewhat reasonable; they see a chance to improve their performance and their relative odds of survival as it were, an opportunity to optimise their outcomes within the bounds of the fairly lax rules regulatory bodies have created.

This is why some key reforms are really necessary to change the way the system works, like scrutinising mergers and acquisitions to make sure that the companies aren't just doing this to build their own monopolies up. The system does clearly require correction.

[Saurav Mandal · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is totally an eye opener to the malpractices of capitalism that if going on, specifically in US. Monopolies are killing free market and cutting through the throats of consumers. Nowadays, no start up dreams of being another Google or Amazon. They know they will be eaten up by these Tech giants. The differences between rich and poor are on the rise like pre World War levels. The ending was not good we already know. Voters know something is wrong with the system - electing Donald Trump, voting for BREXIT are some signs of that. But these monopolies are well connected to White House and they are always safe. Otherwise, why would Moody's and Standard & Poor's still completely dominate the rating market, a decade after rating toxic subprime loans as AAA and helping cause the worst financial crisis since Great Depression.

[Sandra Christen · Rating 5 out of 5]

*4.5
It started off by the authors ranting about this and that which almost made me want to not finish this book. I am happy I did: great food for thought! And quote "Economics is perhaps the only profession where facts don't matter and theory predominates." (p. 158) made me laugh.

[małgosia · Rating 4 out of 5]

a must read. shows perfectly how the us is a democracy only as far as no one but the top 1% is concerned. fairly well researched, argued in an interesting and relatively viable way, though at times somewhat oversimplified or a bit biased. requires additional reading, preferably one with more academic rigour, but overall still a good pick

[Dominik Jurák · Rating 1 out of 5]

So, apparently, monopolies are bad and the American economy is full of them. Authors explicitly state that they don’t want to just offer a description - an analysis - of current state, but that they also want to offer solutions. Too bad the whole book is about stating (and distorting) facts.

What’s worse, the whole book focuses only on one side of the issue - predatory pricing by big firms exploiting economies of scale causes competition to fail and go out of business. What a shame for our “neighbors, friends, fathers, sons and husbands” to be destroyed by big monopolies. Now they need to find something else to do. Not one single mention in the whole book about a fact that lower prices actually benefit consumers at large. Authors feel sorry for failed firms but what if a big firm became big by serving consumers better and for a lower price than competition?

Authors completely discredit economic theory that explains that monopolies and cartels can’t actually exist (at least not for long) because in order to exploit their monopolistic stance they first need to set monopolistic prices - which are prices higher than would otherwise be on free market. But once they start charge these higher prices for low quality products, it invites other firms and resources to undercut these prices which causes monopolies and cartels to seize to exist. Authors state that this doesn’t apply in real world and call the proponents of this theory crazy. According to authors, “free markets inevitably create monopolies” and something has to be done about it. They offer big tech, big pharma and airlines as primary examples. Yet just a few sentences later they say that the state is subsidizing and supporting these monopolies through government cooperation.
So, which is it? Does the free market produces monopolies or is it the government intervention, which helps it to stay in business by keeping competition at bay? Healthcare, banking, airlines, education, and other important sectors are full of government intervention and regulation which prohibits free market competition to even materialize.

Yes, monopolies are bad. They can charge higher prices for a lower quality product than would otherwise be in a competitive environment. But without the state support they cannot exist for long. And in order to even become the only company left in a given industry, it needs first to charge lower prices than competition for years, before it can charge higher prices. This isn’t profitable for any company (without the government support).

One more thing. The authors completely misuse the Latin phrase “Who will guard the guardians?”. They ascribe it to the ability of big tech firms like Facebook, Google and Amazon to collect data and control what gets out there. Yes, control and distribution of information is actually a big component of political power, but big tech firms are, and should be, a part of private sector. Unfortunately, they are in bed with
government.

[Caitlin Renee Steuer · Rating 2 out of 5]

What a bust! This story needs to be told and this book definitely does not tell it. I was looking to form an opinion on a very topical subject this week but the poorly organized content is made more of inflammatory, out of context, click-baitish paragraphs rather than critical thinking.

We get it; everyone is sensing something is “off” and the consumer is no longer free to choose in any industry, crippling capitalism, etc. etc., but this book has a long way to go before spurring productive conversation. A better use of platform would be to explain how antitrust pursuits have gone well in the past and have helped the economy/consumer/innovation. There are examples.

2 stars for some interesting behavioral economics, but even still, it jumped all over the place instead of going deep.

[Michael Broadhurst · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd probably give this 4.5 stars if I could, as it was somewhat repetitive at points, but its flaws are modest at best. It's both a scathing indictment of where capitalism in America is today, while also a remarkably optimistic look at how things could be redirected.

[Cam Sullivan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Entertaining language/tone. Convincing contemporary examples. Infinite references to other books, which I loved. I want to learn more about antitrust law and patent law (patents reduce the threat of competitors/established rivals and give innovators time to monopolize their product). While this book was not too political, it made me want to inform myself on the political arguments on all sides of the discussions on economies, wealth distribution, capitalism, etc.

Author says we live in a “pseudo” version of capitalism where a handful of huge firms have all the market power. Lack of competition leads to a lack of control on prices and wages by consumers and workers, respectively. Further, they argue that regardless of where you fall on the “capitalism to communism” spectrum, more competition is better for society.

I understand the idealistic benefits of pure competition but I don’t know how realistic that is nowadays [in the US? in the world?].

Warren Buffett focuses on investing in companies that have moats to stifle competition within their industries; Buffett loves monopoly or anything close to monopoly (i.e. duopoly, oligopoly). It makes sense, even from a founder’s perspective, to want barriers to entry for competitors.

Silicon Valley loves monopoly because price setting power leads to inflated profits. MBAs are taught to monopolize. M&A reduces # of threats via consolidation. Companies justify mergers by saying synergies and cost savings will be passed on to consumers through lower prices, but this never happens. David constantly turns into Goliath through market consolidation. Facebook, Western Union, etc. It’s a logical “switch”/progression; startups go from someone’s hobby to an entire industry. Surprisingly, the number of new startups has heavily declined since the late 1990s/early 2000s. Most jobs are created by huge firms rather than through the effects of entrepreneurial activity. Small startups are nimble, most productive, and grow fast; big firms are slow and less nimble. Innovation falls as industrial consolidation increases.

Everywhere we look we see the illusion of competition, but very little of it is real competition. Cartels are prevalent in almost every industry, but only about 20% of them are ever detected. The average cartel lasts for five years. The longest running cartel ran for centuries (diamond industry). Historically, periods with very high interest rates have led cartels to prioritize quick returns, often leading to them getting caught.

Firms will often collude to minimize their losses, not always just to maximize their profits. Over time, firms that repeatedly face each other in game theory or prisoner dilemma scenarios will implicitly develop trust and cooperation with one another, leading to optimal long run outcomes in almost every case. The key here is continuous engagement between two firms; lower # of “games” increases likelihood of cheating. Tacit collusion is when competitors simply observe one another and match and respond to each other’s actions. In the long run, this leads to many of the same optimal outcome as overt collusion.

“Selective toxicity” is the same concept as chemotherapy. Excessive regulation kills off startups who can’t afford legal and compliance teams to push through the regulation. Big firms can afford those teams. The government has been captured by the companies and those executives that it’s supposed to regulate. Big Tech spends millions on lobbying the US government per year. During the Obama Administration, 250 employees swapped back-and-forth between Google and the government, in both directions. This political side of Big Tech helps them skirt regulations, lawsuits, and anti-trust cases.

Big Tech companies are essentially publishers for the forms of media that get shared on their platforms. Today’s giants have created an environment that benefits themselves, even when they aren’t the ones to think of the new best ideas. The wealthy own the toll roads while the rest pay to use them. “I would rather earn 1% of 100 people’s efforts than 100% of my own efforts,” John D. Rockefeller.

Author’s conclusion: rising income inequality is not inherent to capitalism. The gap between the rich and the poor is growing because of a lack in competition. This is driven by industry concentration and extremely lax or nonexistent antitrust enforcement, blocking new companies from competing, workers from getting higher wages, and customers from paying lower prices.

[Wael Gamal · Rating 5 out of 5]

المحتكرون يحكمون

لا رأسمالية دون منافسة. هذه المقولة الثابتة في أي كتاب مدرسي أو غير مدرسي يقدم للاقتصاد صارت اليوم محل تشكك. فبدلاً من الأفكار التي تقول إن المنافسة أساس الكفاءة والحافز على الابتكار وإنه في ملعبها يبين الحق من الباطل فتتعدد الاختيارات أمام المستهلك وتنخفض الأسعار ويزدهر الاقتصاد، هناك من يقول الآن إن "الكبير جميل" والسيطرة على الأسواق ليست فقط حقيقة واقعة وإنما هي شرط للكفاءة والنجاح. فتنبهنا هذه الفقرة من أحد كتب الاستثمار الشعبية في الولايات المتحدة قبل الأزمة في 2008، بعنوان: "قواعد الاحتكار: كيف تجد وتستحوذ وتسيطر على أكثر الأسواق ربحية في أي قطاع" أنه "من الغالب أنك تعلمت أن الاحتكارات غير طبيعية، وغير قانونية ونادرة. خطأ! خطأ! خطأ! في الواقع، الاحتكارات هي عادة أمر طبيعي وقانوني، ومنتشرة بشكل مدهش".

غير أن البعض مازال يختلف مع هذا التقدير المتحمس. ففي كتابهما الصادر الشهر الماضي، والذي نال بالفعل ثناء عدد كبير من الاقتصاديين الحائزين على جائزة نوبل في الاقتصاد وغيرهم من اليمين واليسار بقائمة تضم المؤرخ نيال فيرجسون جنباً إلى جنب مع الاقتصادي اليوناني اليساري يانيس فاروفاكيس، يرسم جون تيبير ودينيس هيرن صورة قاتمة لتصاعد نفوذ الاحتكارات في الاقتصاد الأمريكي وسيطرتها على الأسواق. الكاتبان ينتميان حالياً لمؤسسة بحثية استشارية ترعى مديري الأصول، وأولهما له تاريخ كمحلل في بانك أوف أمريكا ومؤسسات مالية أخرى، وهما بالتالي يقفان على أرضية صديقة للنظام الاقتصادي المهيمن على العالم.

***

يبدأ الكتاب بحادثة على شركة طيران يونايتد الأمريكية في أبريل 2017، حين أصر مسؤولوها على استبعاد أحد المسافرين بينما أصر هو على السفر، فأخرجوه مسحولاً ينزف من الطائرة. أجبر فيديو للحادثة، انتشر على وسائل التواصل الاجتماعي، الشركة على الاعتذار والتسوية بعد أن كان رد الفعل الأول لرئيسها غير ذلك. كان من المنتظر أن تؤدي الحادثة لهبوط أسهم الشركة وتراجع المسافرين عن استخدام طائراتها. لكن العكس هو الذي حدث. بل ارتفعت الأسهم بعد أن اكتشفت السوق بفعل الحادثة أن المسافرين ليس لديهم خيار بفعل وضعية الشركة المسيطرة ضمن احتكار القلة لقطاع الطيران الأمريكي. فالشركة التي حققت أرباحاً بقيمة 2.3 مليار دولار في 2016، تتحكم في الحصة الغالبة من السوق في 40 مطاراً من بين حوالي المائة في الولايات المتحدة (60 في المائة في مطار هيوستون و51 في المائة في نيو آرك و43 في المائة في مطار دلس بواشنطن). الأمر نفسه ينطبق على شركة دلتا وغيرها. وبينما يقول الكاتبان إن هذه الشركات تتفق معاً كي تستبعد الداخلين الجدد فإنه "لم يعد أمام المسافرين خيار".

يرصد الكتاب ويحلل تطور الاحتكارات وتوسعها المضطرد في الاقتصاد الأمريكي على مدى العقود الماضية، ليرسم صورة تختلف كثيراً عن الصورة السائدة: شركتان تسيطران على سوق البيرة، أربع شركات طيران تهيمن على حركة المطارات بينما الاحتكار الثنائي هو القاعدة في كل مطار، خمسة بنوك تتحكم في نصف الأصول المصرفية في الاقتصاد الأمريكي، كل أسواق الإنترنت فائق السرعة في الولايات احتكارات محلية، و75 في المائة من العائلات ليس أمامهم إلا مقدم خدمة واحد، أربعة منتجين يتحكمون في سوق اللحوم، وبعد اندماجين هذا العام ستتحكم ثلاث شركات في سوق المبيدات العالمية و80 في المائة من سوق بذور الذرة الأمريكية. والقائمة طويلة.

***

ومن بين رموز الرأسمالية الأمريكية المعاصرة يمثل وارن بافت وبيتر تيل هذا النموذج برغم كل شيء. فالأول وهو من أغنى أغنياء العالم، عادة ما يتم تقديمه على أنه الثري العصامي الذي لم تتغير عاداته، بل وأحياناً ما يقدم رؤى نقدية، والثاني هو ممثل لكل نظريات الابتكار وريادة الأعمال في وادي السيليكون الشهير وهو مؤسس باي بال وأحد المستثمرين في فيسبوك. فالأول معروف، بحسب الكتاب، بأنه لا يستثمر سوى في الشركات التي تمتلك أوضاعاً احتكارية أو مسيطرة في السوق. والثاني، على عكس كل النظريات يدافع مباشرة عن الوضعيات الاحتكارية ويقول إنها شرط مباشر للابتكار، الذي يحتاج لاستثمارات كبرى وشركات ذات حجم هائل.

"الرأسمالية التي نراها اليوم في الولايات المتحدة أبعد ما يكون عن الأسواق التنافسية"، بحسب ما يقول الكاتبان. لكن هذا الوضع ليس قاصراً على الاقتصاد الأمريكي. "فعبر العالم، ينتاب الناس إحساس بأن هناك شيئاً خطأ، مما يقود إلى مستويات قياسية من الشعبوية في الولايات المتحدة وأوروبا، وإلى تراجع التسامح ورغبة في قلب النظام القائم. اليمين واليسار لا يستطيعان الاتفاق على تعريف المشكلة لكنهما يعرفان أن هناك شيئاً عفناً"، كما يقول الكتاب مشيراً إلى أن الحديث يجب أن يكون عن احتكار القلة وليس الاحتكار المنفرد.

***

قبل أيام في مصر، ألغى جهاز حماية المنافسة عقود توزيع شركات أبل الأمريكية في مصر بسبب قيامهم بالاتفاق على عزل السوق المصري جغرافيًّا من عوامل المنافسة البينية وحظر الاستيراد الموازي وعقد اتفاقات توزيع حصرية بالمخالفة للمادة 7 من قانون حماية المنافسة، وهو ما أدى إلى ارتفاع أسعار منتجات شركة أبل في مصر بصورة غير مبررة تفوق أسعار ذات المنتجات في دول الشرق الأوسط كالمملكة العربية السعودية والإمارات العربية المتحدة ودولة الكويت وكذا الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية. وقبلها حقق الجهاز في قضايا تتعلق بشركتي أوبر وكريم للنقل وسيطرة شركة بي إن سبورت على بث المباريات تليفزيونياً. الاحتكار ظاهرة مصرية أيضا. لكنها ليست قاصرة وليست أساساً متعلقة بشركات أجنبية كبرى، بينما تتضاءل قوة الجهاز القانونية والفعلية أمام جهاز مكافحة الاحتكارات الأمريكي، الذي يثبت الكتاب عدم قدرته برغم كل إمكاناته على مواجهة الاحتكارات. فيقول الكتاب إن الشركات الاحتكارية في أمريكا باتت تتحكم في المشرعين ومنظمي السوق. وفي مصر، بَرَّأ الجهاز سوقي الأسمنت والحديد من تهم الممارسات الاحتكارية (كان الجهاز قد فرض قبل سنوات غرامات بعشرة ملايين جنيه على مسؤولي شركات الأسمنت بعد ثبوت تلاعبهم في الأسعار، بعد أن كانت الشركات قد حققت أرباحا ً بالمليارات على مدى سنوات).

لا تقلل الاحتكارات فقط من اختيارات المستهلكين، وتحدد الأسعار بأعلى من قيمتها فيما يسميه الاقتصاديون "تشوهات الأسعار"، وإنما بالأساس تضمن معدلات ربحية مرتفعة جداً لمن يملكون أسهم الشركات المحتكرة على حساب مستويات معيشة الأغلبية. ليس هذا فقط بل إنها تسببت، بحسب الكتاب، في استثمارات أقل، وحركية اقتصادية أضعف، وشركات جديدة أقل، وأسعار أعلى لمبيعات الشركات المهيمنة، وأجور أقل، ولا مساواة متفاقمة في الدخل والثروة. و"تتدفق الأدلة على ذلك من الدراسات الاقتصادية كالفيضان". بل إن الكاتبين يعتبران جزءاً كبيراً من النمو الاقتصادي في الولايات المتحدة نتاجاً لتلاعب القلة المحتكرة في البورصات من خلال عمليات إعادة شراء الأسهم وغيرها.

***

وتحذرنا مدير عام صندوق النقد الدولي كريستين لاجارد، في خطاب لها في مكتبة الكونجرس قبل أيام، من أنه مع حلول عام 2040، يمكن أن تصل اللامساواة إلى مستويات تفوق ما كانت عليه في "العصر المذهَّب". فالاحتكارات القوية في مجال التكنولوجيا والحكومات الضعيفة ذات السياسات المحلية غير فعالة تجعلان النجاح مستحيلاً بالنسبة للمشروعات البادئة ورواد الأعمال. والإنجازات المحققة في المجال الصحي يمكن أن تتيح للأغنياء الأكثر ثراءً أن يعيشوا إلى عمر يتجاوز المائة والعشرين عاماً، بينما يرزح الملايين تحت وطأة الفقر المدقع والمرض."

كتاب تيبير وهيرن، المختار من الفاينانشيال تايمز كأحد أهم كتب الاقتصاد خلال السنة الحالية، يقول إن هذه ليست إلا نسخة مزيفة من الرأسمالية "الحقة"، داعياً لسلسلة إجراءات تفَعِّل قوانين مكافحة الاحتكار وتقوي أجهزتها لاستعادة ما يعتبره روح الحرية الرأسمالية. يستشهد الكتاب بالبيان الشيوعي لكارل ماركس وفريدريك إنجلز منتقداً إياه بالقول إن الملكية الخاصة قد انتصرت، وإن الرأسمالية برغم بعض حقبها المظلمة "هي أفضل ما لدينا"، لكن كل ما يرصده الكتاب هو شرح مفصل لما أسماه الأول "تركيز وتركز رأس المال" كسمة أساسية للرأسمالية، حيث يفرض تطورها وأزماتها المتوالية أن تصبح وحدات تراكم رأس المال، الشركات، أقل في العدد وأكبر في الحجم، وأكثر
شراسة في اقتناص الأرباح على حساب كل شيء وأي شيء.
http://www.shorouknews.com/mobile/col...

[Pinar · Rating 2 out of 5]

Oldukça enteresan bir kitap aslında, ama yazarın şizofren olduğunu düşünüyorum. Böyle bir kitabı yazıp, aynı zamanda aslında kapitalizm muhteşem bir sistem, monopoller canavar demek bana pek sağlıklı bir kafa işareti gibi gelmedi. Yazarın günümüz kapitalizminin sorunlarını anlattığı örneklerle çok rahat bir komünist propaganda kitabı yazılabilir.

Yazar solcu değil. "Marx zaten para kazanmaktan anlamayan beş parasızın biriydi", "Engels babasının şirketinden çaldığı paralarla yaşadı", "Monopoller zararlı, en büyük monopolist Stalin'di", "Monopollerin yaşaması mümkün değil, bakın en büyük monopol SSCB çöktü", "Thomas Piketty'nin kitabı çok satmış, ama kimse okumamış aslında, kindle'dan kimse not almamış, kitap zaten anlaşılmaz tablolarla dolu", "Fransa'da akademisyenler zaten Marksist olur" gibi uzayıp giden yazarın niçin kurduğu belli olmayan cümleleri dikkate almazsanız kitap daha rahat okunur olabilir.

Kitaba dair bir iki nokta daha var değinmek istediğim. Yazarın bir dünya sistemi olarak kapitalizmi incelediği, evrensel bir eser yazdığını düşünmeyin. Tamamen Amerikan merkezli bir bakış açısı ve tarihsellik içinde. İçinde II.Dünya Savaşı Alman tröstlerine değinilmiş ama orada da evrensel bir bakış açısıyla objektiviteyle değerlendime yaptığını düşünmüyorum. Kitabın içindeki tarihsel örneklerin ben pek neye, niye hizmet ettiğini anlayamadım.

Özetle yazar aslında gerçek kapitalizmin muhteşem bir sistem olduğunu, bugünün monopolleşmiş devlerinin insanları nasıl zalimce ezdiği, ekonomiyi elinde tuttuğunu falan anlatıyor. Pek kimseye okumasını tavsiye edeceğim tutarlılıkta ve bütünlükte bir kitap değil.

Okurken bir ara tek yıldız vermeyi düşünüyordum, biraz ilerledikten sonra gerçekten büyük bir heyecanla, bunları yazdıktan sonra konuyu nasıl güzel-kapitalizme bağlayacak acaba diye merakla devam ettim, bazı yerlerde kahkahalarımı tutamadım. Sonuçta bütün tutarsızlıklarına rağmen beni eğlendirdi, o bakımdan 2 yıldız.

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good book discussing the rise of monopolies and oligopolies and showing how market concentration in the hands of just a few people is incredibly detrimental. They present compelling evidence illustrating how little choice American consumers actually have in their daily lives. They also show how recent merger waves result in anticompetitive and price-raising effects, despite the loud claims that consumers somehow benefit from the mergers.

However, there were two comments in the conclusion that I didn't quite agree with. First, the author made a statement that inequality by itself isn't a bad thing, it's just a symptom of the problem of lack of competition. But there's all sorts of research evidence that shows that inequality by itself is arguably a very bad thing, as it is associated closely with lower life expectancy, worse health, higher crime and incarceration rates, higher drug abuse rates, higher teen birth rates, and lower academic performance across society. Inequality is a better predictor of these trends of societal disfunction than absolute poverty rates.

Second, the conclusion said that higher taxes on the rich isn't going to fix the problem. Again, I see the point, and perhaps I'm reading into this too much, but the tone seemed to be saying that taxing the wealthy isn't a good idea at all. And while taxing the wealthy might not be addressing the root of the problem, and it should definitely be done in collaboration with enforcing antitrust laws, it can absolutely be a part of the answer. The approach argued in this book is to implement policies that reverse the trends of market power concentration, which would address inequality in the pre-tax/transfer income distribution. But since inequality by itself is problematic, taxing the rich would be beneficial as it would help reduce inequality from the post-tax/transfer distribution of income.

[Tõnu Vahtra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Monopolies are bad, oligopolies are even worse, Buffett and Thiel are bad (for supporting the death of capitalism), Picketty's Capital on 21th Century is crap and other stories... I certainly agree with many of the arguments from the author, but the view is slightly narrow/simplified and criticism is not presented in properly argumented manner. There seem to be two major themes in this book: cursing the big technology companies (primarily Google, Facebook and Amazon) and trying to explain the problems with US political landscape that have led to unhealthy competitive situation (the lack of it). Still there were also principles that were interesting to reflect on: for example how stricter regulatory requirements create increasingly difficult conditions for smaller companies and new entrants which pushes a sector towards oligopolies. From other end I disagree with how the author categorically condemns any form of share buyback initiatives.

“This brings us to the very ugly truth about regulation: while big businesses often complain about regulation, the truth is that even though it is painful and annoying, they don't mind it and even favor it. Regulations that are burdensome enough to kill small companies but are not strong enough to kill large ones are, in fact, ideal.”

“All around the world, people have an overwhelming sense that something is broken. This is leading to record levels of populism in the United States and Europe, resurgent intolerance, and a desire to upend the existing order. The left and right cannot agree on what is wrong, but they both know that something is rotten. Capitalism has been the greatest system in history to lift people out of poverty and create wealth, but the “capitalism” we see today in the United States is a far cry from competitive markets. What we have today is a grotesque, deformed version of capitalism. Economists such as Joseph Stiglitz have referred to it as “ersatz capitalism,” where the distorted representation we see is as far away from the real thing as Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean are from real pirates. If what we have is a fake version of capitalism, what does the real thing look like? What should we have? According to the dictionary, the idealized state of capitalism is “an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange, characterized by the freedom of capitalists to operate or manage their property for profit in competitive conditions.”

[Alper · Rating 1 out of 5]

i was gonna give 2 stars in the beginning because i thought it was still giving some correct real world examples of what is going on, but i changed my mind after just hearing all the neo-classical capitalist bs. so, the story of this book is it is giving the correct examples of what is going on in the industry but imposing wrong ideas why poor "capitalism" is abused by monopolies and all that shit (regulations, etc.) to malfunction. in short, capitalism is the perfect system but we need to make everyone and 237120371293871 other factors perfect ("because the market is perfect and everything that happens to it are external factors") and it will work like in the Henry Ford way! The book is really piece of garbage especially with its funny recipes and root causes but it has got the perfect market examples.
+++ (will write more how this book amused me if i have time later)

[Bethany Bremer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the few economics books I’ve ever read. I can recommend it enough. It was well-researched and well-positioned for its audience.

If you’ve ever wondered why exactly the rich keep getting richer while the poor work hard to stay where they’re at, check this book out. If you’ve ever wondered why you can only choose one airline at your regional hub or why all flight prices rise together, give this a read. If you ever wondered how a billion dollar company can offer its devices for free, this one is for you. If you’ve ever been annoyed by the fact that your productivity at work doesn’t seem to translate to wealth, you might find out why. If you’re fed up with “capitalism” as it currently exists (me too), pick up this book.

Laid out with shocking clarity, this book gives real solutions to real problems. Surprisingly, the answer to political and economical freedom (which you will learn are inherently connected) is not less capitalism, but more of it. Capitalism without competition isn’t capitalism. The economy we are sporting in America a today isn’t exactly the free market economy our ancestors had in mind. But monopolies aren’t anything new.

[Hazel Thayer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book whips, slaps ass, slayed, ate and left no crumbs, etc etc. The fact that it is fairly nonpartisan (other than the requisite and objectively correct "Fuck Reagan" vibes ofc) is just incredible. I literally cannot stop thinking about it. I want to talk to everyone I know about how the lack of antitrust enforcement and legislation ruined the world. In fact, I try. They have generally been responding with "Anti... trust?" and then I go "yeah, governments are supposed to break up big monopolies when they control too much of the market" and then they go, "what?!" and I go, "literally yes, monopolies should be illegal." The fact that a book can make me agree that companies should be LESS regulated is literally a miracle. I read it nearly all in one sitting.

I'd subtract a star for not offering great solutions to the problems, but then I'd add another star cuz I wish I could give it six.

Edit: Other people noting the repetitiveness are clearly used to reading less boring books than I. The books I usually slog through made this one feel fast-paced and dynamic LOL

[Carlos · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great book in its explanations of how capitalism is so warped from its theoretical base why that's the case, how monopolies have materialized and why. Also presents good ideas and solutions for both right and left. I especially enjoyed his defence of Unions and Workers' Rights, so unusual in a liberal author.

Nevertheless, I feel like the author gets too dragged by his initial bias towards a capitalism devoid of monopolies that as he explains... Has never actually existed. I would have appreciated more openness towards the topic of capitalism itself.

In any way, very recommended regardless of your political position!

[Alice Opiyo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book did a good job of explaining the dangers of capitalism and how the U.S. is no longer operating under a capitalist model due to monopolies and oligopolies. I disagreed with the authors though that the solution is to reorient the U.S. to true capitalism rather than looking for a different model like socialism. Because of greed and the imperfect nature of humans we need to find a model that doesn’t base human rights on the whims of humans. We need a model that guarantees people a living wage, health care, etc.

[Carol · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars for me. The subject material is not something I am super interested in. The parts that I did find interesting were the more modern day references to Amazon and Facebook, which I could really understand. I would say non-fiction isn’t my cup of tea, but i was able to get through it. For someone who isn’t enthralled by this content, if you’re like me and non-fiction really doesn’t vibe with you, skip this one.

[Jate Saitthiti]

"Capitalism without competition is not capitalism."

The author explains how large corporations create competition barriers in their industries by doing things like merging and acquiring companies to gain market share and raising product or service prices. Or even patent dominance in the sector.

In another vein, I've learned more about a business moat.

[Kurt Jensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Among the most important works of history, economics and political thought. Must-read for citizens.

[Kiran Bhat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely well written book with free flowing and insightful content

[Feng Ouyang · Rating 3 out of 5]

Capitalism is the most profound identity of America. Yet, it has become the subject of hot debate in recent decades. The lefts blame growing inequality on capitalism and seek more government power to check the “greed” of capitalists. The rights insist that the free market is the best medicine, but they don’t have much to show for it. Recently, however, the rights have grown wary about powerful billionaires pushing progressive agendas and have turned against tech companies. In “The myth of Capitalism,” Jonathan Tepper points out that the culprit of America’s ail is monopoly, which is a deviation from the free-market spirit that we hold sacred. The book presents convincing evidence of monopoly's prevalence in America's economy and its harm. Unfortunately, the solutions that the book advocates are narrow and ineffective.

The book argues that monopoly in America is far from isolated. Instead, industrial concentration happens in all aspects of our life. Airlines, cable services, supermarkets, hospitals, gasoline, and grocery providers all experience the shock of monopoly.

The most direct form of monopoly is one or several companies dominating an industry. For example, the three largest airlines in the U.S. take the majority of the passenger market. A grocery producer could own all major brands of drinks or cereals on the market. Over the past several decades, the number of firms in almost all industries has diminished. Monopoly and oligopoly (a small number of sellers or buyers) emerge in many sectors. Big companies aggressively merge with each other in the name of synergy and efficiency, and workers and customers suffer the consequences.

Big firms can also achieve a monopoly by dividing the market. Although anti-trust agencies may be happy to see multiple firms in an industry, competition could still be absent. For example, an airline can dominate a “hub” airport or a particular route to achieve pricing power, although it is not technically a monopoly at the national scale. Cable service companies and supermarkets also divvy up service areas to avoid competition. Many American locales are dominated by one large employer, who then plays as a monopsony (the only buyer) in the labor market. In addition to the national market, we should put a pulse on the actual level of competition.

With a few players, the firms collude in coordinating pricing and other business practices to gain monopoly power. Although this is illegal, it isn't easy to catch. Furthermore, firms can coordinate through “signaling” and “tit for tat” gaming instead of explicit collusion. This happens not only on the selling side (for example, airlines tend to raise and reduce prices in tandem) but also on the buying side. HR departments in big firms claim to pay “market prevailing wages,” which are set by themselves and other big employers. Collusion is a tricky business, and consumers and citizens are often too naïve to catch on.

An even subtler form of monopoly is “horizontal ownership,” where a prominent investor owns significant shares of all major players in an industry. They benefit not from one firm’s outperforming another but from the rising profit of the whole industry. Horizontal ownership not only encourages monopolistic behaviors from CEOs of these companies but may also provide a mechanism for collusion at board meetings. Another form of ownership monopoly is overboarding, meaning senior company officials serve on boards of their competitors. When wealth is concentrated, so is power. Horizontal ownership and overboarding allow the wealthy to become monopolies even if the companies appear not to be.

Monopoly has become the norm of American economic life. Why should we worry about it? The book argues that monopoly is harmful in many ways. Besides the obvious harms of rising prices, deteriorated services, and depressed wages, monopoly stifles innovation, distorts resource allocation, and lowers efficiency. Most importantly, monopolistic firms have extraordinary political power and the will to use them. This presents a threat to American democracy. The book even propositions that if monopoly is left unchecked, we may repeat the history of Nazi Germany, where nationalized economy (a form of monopoly) fueled dictatorship. Monopoly is especially dangerous in the age of data when one company has access to all our personal data and can manipulate our behavior for its benefit.

The author dispelled the notion that some forms of monopoly are beneficial as they improve efficiency and have more resources available for innovation. The book demonstrated that industry concentration usually coincides with periods of lower efficiency and lower rates of innovation. However, the book did not delve into the question of why this would happen. Maybe a monopolistic firm lacks the motivation for improvement and innovation, and it has the power to suppress others from doing that. However, the book did not make a convincing argument on that part.

As to the solution, the author is looking to the government. Government should strengthen its anti-trust enforcement and enhance overseeing in industries with natural monopolies, such as social media and online services, where the network effect is essential. On the other hand, the author contends that excessive regulations aid monopoly. Regulations block and stifle newcomers and small players. Big firms often influence or control the regulating process and use it to lock in market share and create entry barriers.

The book called out “Capital in the Twenty-First Century” by Thomas Piketty. While the author shares Piketty’s concerns on economic inequality and the diminishing share of labor in outcome distribution, he thinks that the problem is not the growth of capital but the capital in monopolistic forms. The author also accused “Capital in the Twenty-First Century” of sloppy academics and said that spreadsheet errors jeopardize the conclusions. These assertions do not agree with what I read from other reviews.

In my view, “The Myth of Capitalism” addressed a critical yet often ignored problem of monopoly in the modern economy, especially in the U.S. economy. The existence and harm of monopoly are made clear by the book. However, the proposed solution is very narrow-minded. The proposal of strengthening government supervision and reducing government regulation sounds mundane and empty. This is not surprising because the book limits itself to phenomenological studies without digging deeper. Is relaxation of Government oversight the only reason for the alleged monopoly booming since the 1970s? Are there different types of monopolies that require different solutions? If some kinds of monopolies are inevitable, how would we accept the monopoly while limiting its harmful effects? In my mind, the book yields more questions than answers.

The book would also do well by examining some famous cases. For example, AT&T used to be the monopolistic telephone company in the U.S. It also contributed many revolutionary technologies to humanity, including information theory, transistors, industrial laser, UNIX operating system, etc. AT&T technologies were de facto international standards in telecommunication. In the 1980s, AT&T was broken up by the U.S. government. Today, no significant telecommunication companies are owned by the U.S. except for regional operating companies still enjoying monopoly status. Did the breaking up of AT&T eliminate the chokehold on innovation, or did it kill the golden goose? Another example would be IBM research centers. How does IBM’s innovation potency correlate with its monopolistic status?

Another missing perspective is international competition. How would the West respond to the emergence of state capitalism in many places, especially China? State capitalism is a form of monopoly that cannot be checked by anti-trust laws. Can we compete with state capitalism with a purely free market economy? Perhaps we should look at the history of Japan in the 1980s when Japanese firms leverage their monopolistic power on the domestic market to improve their international competitiveness. Did it work in the short run? How about in the long run? Do we need a global anti-trust regulatory system to support the global economy?

While the book is convincing in stating the problems, its credibility could be improved if the author is more discriminative in evidence choices. The book tends to pile on many pieces of evidence and arguments to belabor some obvious conclusions. The high-quality evidence, such as statistics and authoritative studies, are diluted by low-quality ones, such as correlations and quotes from less-known people. Furthermore, I think the author misinterpreted some quotes. For example, the author cited Clayton Christensen’s seminal book “The Innovator’s Dilemma” to support his view that large companies are inferior in the innovation competition and thus are less efficient. However, that is not what Christensen said. Instead, Christensen contends that big and small firms are good at different things. Big firms are better at incremental improvements as market incumbents, while small firms thrive in disruptive innovations that chip markets away. Readers should be careful in scrutinizing the evidence presented in the book, even if they do not question the conclusions.

The problem of monopoly is not new or hidden. However, “The Myth of Capitalism” highlights the importance. While I find the book illuminating, I disagree that monopoly is the only, or even the most important, problem in today’s economy. If you are interested in this book, you should also check out some earlier books, such as “The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism” by John Bogle (2006) and “The Price of Inequality” by Joseph Stiglitz (2013). These books provide a more comprehensive examination of today’s capitalist system. “The Myth of Capitalism” is valuable in our conversation. We need more thinking and studies building on this foundation.

[Luis Santos · Rating 4 out of 5]

4,5