For a second day in a row, I return to the opinions of Robert Reich. It's time, he writes, to break up the digital trusts. One hundred years ago, The first Gilded Age produced giant economic monopolies:
America’s first Gilded Age began in the late 19th century with a raft of innovations – railroads, steel production, oil extraction – but culminated in mammoth trusts run by “robber barons” like JP Morgan, John D Rockefeller, and William H “the public be damned” Vanderbilt.
The answer then was to bust up the railroad, oil and steel monopolies.
Unfortunately, history has repeated itself:
We’re now in a second Gilded Age, ushered in by semiconductors, software and the internet, which has spawned a handful of hi-tech behemoths and a new set of barons like Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Jeff Bezos of Amazon, and Sergey Brin and Larry Page of Google.
The answer is the same as it was before: bust up the monopolies.
These three trusts control the economic landscape:
Nearly 90% of all internet searches now go through Google. Facebook and Google together account for 58% of all digital ads, which is where most ad money goes these days.
They’re also the first stops for many Americans seeking news (93% receive news online), and Amazon is now the first stop for a third of all American consumers seeking to buy anything.
With such size comes the power to stifle innovation. Amazon won’t let any business that sells through it sell any item at a lower price anywhere else. It’s even using its control over book sales to give books it publishes priority over rival publishers.
Google uses the world’s most widely used search engine to promote its own services and content over those of competitors. Facebook’s purchases of WhatsApp and Instagram killed off two potential competitors.
Contrary to the conventional view of America as a hotbed of entrepreneurship, according to the Census Bureau, the rate at which new job-creating businesses have formed in the US has halved since 2004.
Amazon – the richest corporation in America – paid nothing in federal taxes last year. Meanwhile, it is holding an auction to extort billions from states and cities eager to host its second headquarters.
It also forced Seattle, its home city, to back down on a plan to tax big corporations like itself to pay for homeless shelters for a growing population that cannot afford sky-high rents caused in part by Amazon.
Facebook withheld evidence of Russian activity on its platform far longer than had been disclosed. When the news came to light, it employed an opposition research firm to discredit
And the individual wealth of their founders is stratospheric:
The combined wealth of Zuckerberg ($62.3bn), Bezos ($131bn), Brin ($49.8bn) and Page ($50.8bn) is larger than the combined wealth of the bottom half of the American population.
Senator Elizabeth Warren has propsed breaking up these three monopolies. She's a Democratic. But she says the president she most admires is Teddy Roosevelt -- a Republican.
Once upon a time, there used to be progressive Republicans.
Image: inunsourlae.gq
6 comments:
The present moment was foretold by James Madison in Federalist 39:
…we may define a republic to be, or at least may bestow that name on, a government which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the people, and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure, for a limited period, or during good behavior. It is ESSENTIAL to such a government that it be derived from the great body of the society, not from an inconsiderable proportion, or a favored class of it; otherwise a handful of tyrannical nobles, exercising their oppressions by a delegation of their powers, might aspire to the rank of republicans, and claim for their government the honorable title of republic.
If only this party of so-called constitutional originalists would actually espouse the principles of the founding fathers they pretend to revere.
Cap
Precisely, Cap. I can add nothing of substance to your -- and Madison's -- observation.
To your original point, Owen, it looks like some people are finally waking up to the threat of digital monopolies. The German government's antitrust office ruled last week that Facebook was exploiting consumers by requiring them to agree to its data collection practices in order to have an account. The regulator prohibited FB's data collection practices, effectively blowing a hole in the company's advertising model. More here: www.wired.com/story/germany-facebook-antitrust-ruling/
Cap
Europe seems to be ahead of us, Cap. We're afraid to take on our own offspring.
I agree with what has been stated, but I believe the problem is much more complicated. It’s not only the concentration of wealth but what the super rich capitalists achieve with their wealth and that is to gain power, power through government. ‘Citizens United’ a misnomer if there was one, has allowed effectively unlimited spending on campaigns to elect the president and members of Congress. Even many judgeships are elected. In this age of TV, internet ads, a lot of them negative and at best distorted version of reality, it is quite possible to have “The best government money can buy”. One need only look at how the total amounts spent on elections in the US have skyrocketed in the last couple of decades. Where are all these billions coming from? Not likely $5 contributions. McCain-Feingold is but a distant memory. Look at the latest rounds of tax cuts brought in. Who benefits most? I think we know the answer to that. Inheritance taxes are all but gone.
So the very rich, the ruling class, have not only wealth but near total power. One of Bernie Sanders main objectives if elected President in 2016 would have been to nominate Supreme Court justices who would overturn Citizens United. Well, look at how that turned out. Doubt Gorsuch or Kavanaugh will back that idea. Concentration of wealth in the very few is one thing but concentration of power is much worse. Senator Warren may very well think as she does, but her chances of becoming President are slim to none as she is a threat to ‘them’, as is Sanders and anyone else who proposes curbing their excesses. Trump’s referral to Warren as ‘Pocahontas’ is only the beginning. Reich often talks about the evils of income, asset inequality, but in reality it is only increasing. Just the way the greedy want it. Hard to for me to see it changing much any time soon. Hope I’m wrong. Mac
I hope you're wrong, too, Mac. I'm old enough to remember when American cities burned dduring long hot summers. Americans may be headed toward that kind of history repeating itself, as well.
Post a Comment