Monopoly Round-Up: Just Stop the Anthropic IPO Already
We shouldn’t want people to become superrich by building unsafe technology. The government has the authority to block the IPO. It should. Plus, government lies about health costs, and more...
Economics
BIG by Matt Stoller.
Matt Stoller on monopoly power, antitrust, and the politics of corporate consolidation.
Recent essays
30 of 40Stop Panicking About AI
Why are big AI firm trying to create billionaires from a technology they say may end the world? There are real risks to AI, but something is very off about the latest social panic.
Monopoly Round-Up: The Enshittification of the American Hamburger
Lots of news, as usual.
How the LSAT Become the Ticketmaster of Law School Admissions
The Law School Admissions Council, once a nonprofit designed to help students, is now the Ticketmaster for law school admissions. We are teaching young lawyers that law is about cheating.
Monopoly Round-Up: Did America Just Set Up an FDA for Big Tech?
47 states settled with Meta over harms to kids. It’s not a strong settlement, but America now has the outlines of an FDA for big tech. Plus, rage on the ranch, record corporate profits, and more.
Why Political Moderates Are Losing
Opposing corporate power used to make you a moderate. Now it means you’re radical. Who controls the label of moderate is a good lens into the power of finance.
Monopoly Round-Up: Living in an Age of Cheating Means Having Your Time Stolen Constantly
The rise in tech-enabled scalable ways to cheat imposes a hidden time tax on all of us, even when we don’t fall for scams. Plus, more Dem upsets against big money, and Paramount aligns with Flock.
Monopoly Round-Up: What Happens When Oligarchs Stop Being Polite
Concentrated capital has a bunch of weapons it can deploy against regulatory threats. One of the most common is the capital strike, which Paramount is right now using.
The Secret Society of Nerds Who Control Congress and Ruin Our Health Care
When a health insurer won't replace an amputated leg, the reason isn't because it saves money. It's because the nerds at the Congressional Budget Office stop Congress from fixing our system.
Monopoly Round-Up: A Judge Condemns Facebook for Enabling Mass Sexual Exploitation of Kids
Big tech is in a lot of trouble, as the law, the financing, and the American people turn against them. Plus, Amazon's antitrust troubles, and a crack in the electric utility high billing scam.
BOOM! An Anti-Monopolist Smashed the Democratic Establishment in Michigan Last Night
Populist Abdul El-Sayed shocked the Democratic Party establishment by beating an incumbent Congresswoman for a Senate nominating contest, despite being outspent nine to one. What comes now?
Monopoly Round-Up: Are Big AI Firms Cooking the Books?
If we're going to dump trillions into AI, it's time to audit the books of the big AI companies to see how the business actually works. That's how New Dealers would have done it.
Google Maps, Uber, and Wall Street Run on Socialism: How the U.S. Government Built the Global Positioning System
The Federal government built a global navigation system, nicknamed "Lighthouses in the Sky" on which Google Maps, Wall Street, and shipping rely. Just don't call it socialism.
Monopoly Round-Up: How to Stop the Enshittification of America
Cheating as a business model exists because Americans can no longer sue big business. A Democratic Congress could fix this problem with one simple law. Plus, a defeat for Paramount-Warner, and more...
The Resistance Liberal Lawyers Helping Trump Take Over the Media
Executives and big law lawyers in the Nexstar-TEGNA case are openly showing contempt for a judge. And the ABA Antitrust bar is silent on the corruption of the Paramount-Warner merger.
Judge Puts Warner-Paramount Merger On Hold
Today was a good day for the anti-monopoly movement, and Hollywood artists. It was not a good day for Oracle billionaire Larry Ellison and his legal team trying to roll up Hollywood.
Monopoly Round-Up: Video Gamers Rebel Against Sony, Microsoft, and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act
Sony will no longer ship physical copies of games, prompting widespread anger from customers at how their ownership rights are being stripped by powerful monopolies. Plus, SpaceX craters...
BOOM! Billionaires Punched in the Nose Over Paramount-Warner by State Enforcers, Unions
The Paramount-Warner merger challenge looks odd, but that's only because all the other cops are bought off. Here are the arguments for and against the deal, and the process going forward.
Monopoly Round-Up: States to Challenge Paramount-Warner, Billionaire Larry Ellison Lashes Out Wildly
“They’re completely driven by antisemitism and socialism,” say a source in the New York Post about deal opponents. Plus, a merger boom, and someone let a squirrel loose in Meta's offices...
You'll Own Nothing and Be Happy: Why It's So Hard to Break John Deere's Control Over Farming
It's not hard to help America's farmers escape from John Deere's monopoly. But actually breaking the firm's inefficient control over equipment would cut against our strategy of Number Go Up.
Monopoly Round-Up: Dealing with a July 4th Organized by Scoundrels
Donald Trump's self-dealing and corruption are fostering an oligarchy, with laws organized by the Supreme Court. Can America defeat the vision offered eighty years ago of a cynical nihilistic society?
Crime Pays: The Egg Bandits Made A Thousand Times the Fine They Just Paid for Price Fixing
The Stringer Bell rule is obsolete, as Trump and state attorneys general let the egg producers off the hook for a brazen conspiracy. Still, egg prices did drop as a result of the investigation.
Monopoly Round-Up: Why Wall Street Isn't Yet Afraid of the Left
In 1995, Newt Gingrich killed the ability of the left to project power. It hasn't recovered. Plus, Trump picks a new antitrust chief, the end of cheap electronics, and the AI bubble wobbles...
Yes, Gas Prices Are Being Manipulated by Price Fixing Software.
As populist politicians win elections, the anti-monopoly movement attacks new AI driven price-fixing hiking the cost of gas, meat, rent, electronics, et al. But can the new populists govern?
Monopoly Round-Up: How Wall Street Tried Replacing the Civil Rights Movement With Human Resources
On Friday - Juneteenth - Obama opened his oligarch-funded library. What does this moment say about race and finance? Plus, the FTC stops enforcing Robinson-Patman, the AI bubble worsens, and more...
Why the Iran War Hasn't Crashed the Economy
In the 1970s, governments prepared for oil shocks. It turns out, stockpiling and diversification works, which is probably why economists hate doing it.
Monopoly Round-Up: The Pope and a Silicon Valley Trillionaire Fight Over God
Elon Musk is a trans-humanist, the ultimate expression of the Chicago School philosophy. The Pope offers a different vision about how limits make us human. Plus, Iran, Warner/Paramount, and more...
What Would It Look Like If the AI Bubble Popped?
It's now consensus that we're in a bubble of investment in AI data centers, and that it's a risk to our economy. If the stock market declines, how bad could it get? Where are there areas of contagion?
Monopoly Round-Up: Graham Platner and Stock Market Democrats
Controversy erupted in a Maine Senate race, causing Democrats nationwide to go at each others' throat. Fights over oligarchy are becoming unavoidable.
A Billionaire Explains Why American Business Now Feels like the Mafia
In his autobiography "Born to Be Wired," Warner board member and billionaire John Malone describes how he helped turn America into a society focused on greed and market power.