Recently, I received a notice from Quicken that I will no longer be able to use the 2008 version I bought to download records from my financial institutions. I bought the 2008 version because they changed formats which stopped the downloading in the earlier format. I don't want to buy another version. I don't want any of the bells and whistles that I will supposedly get by upgrading. All I want is a place to keep track of my transactions and periodically see how I"m doing. However, without downloading, the current software will become worthless to me. I have tried to identify an alternative that would allow me to do the basics but the pickings are slim. They are even slimmer if you try and find an alternative in Mac. I've tried several demos but they just don't work. Reading the comments along the way, it appears that Quicken identifies any real competitors and then just buys them out before they can threaten their monopoly. They are then free to abuse their users by forcing regular upgrades by taking away features that existed when we paid their fees. This is to just keep the fees flowing, apparently, now every three years, even though they offer nothing extra to entice voluntary upgrading.
This experience with Quicken got me thinking about our entire economy and how monopolies are taking over our lives by buying out the competitors. Companies used to grow and expand by inventing and improving their products, but now they just grow through acquisition. If someone offers something new and exciting, just buy them out, don't compete.
This is true with many of our industries:
* Media through Comcast, Viacom, Disney which now own almost all the network and cable stations, and Verizon and ATT which will soon control the content arriving on your computer, despite the pretent net neutrality rules of the FCC.
* Finance where the big 5 financial institutions which brought us financial armageddon now hold 60% of GDP http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/shooting-banks up significantly since the crisis, as the perpetrators were the chief beneficiaries of the financial failures wrought by the crisis.
* Pharmaceuticals, some of which have combined names longer than their chemical formulas, but still spend less on R&D than advertising.
* Health insurers which control the health care industry through Blue Cross, Humana, United Health and Cigna.
*Agriculture where just a very few food conglomerates like Cargill, Arthur Daniels Midland, and Tyson dominate all aspects of food production from farm to market.
*Energy which has significantly consolidated into a small number of huge companies in oil, coal and natural gas.
These are the big groupings but they are hardly alone.
This monopolization is also true with niche industries, like financial software. Once they get a big enough share, they can force their way on their customers and competitors without worrying about their customers abandoning them. If a truly new and improved product is invented or developed, then just use your considerable assets to buy them out. If your assets aren't enough, then just leverage the buyout through the hedge funds and all. Nothing stands in the way of this monopolization.
In Teddy Roosevelt's time, trust busting became the way to really bring back the free market but now it has almost gone the way of extinct animals. Bigger is better appears to be today's philosophy run amok! We only pay lip service to free enterprise, because monopoly capitalism is anything but the market that Adam Smith envisioned. Yet corporate power seems too great, that there does not appear to be solution.
With these monopolies also come great political clout. Anything that threatens their monopoly which cannot be bought out can be crushed through legal maneuvers, regulations, and legislation. These are delivered by the bought and paid for political class which is dedicated primarily to getting or staying in office. These trends may be unstoppable, but that doesn't make them any the less ominous. This realization has left me disturbed and pessimistic. I'm just not sure how to fight.
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