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Comment by kurthr | Hacker News Reader

I'm not sure the government is actively killing it... they just aren't doing anything about the oligopolies and collusion that have always developed in these sort of situations. That may seem subtle, but many argue that we want to make the government do less to "keep them off our backs". Well, guess what these are the consequences. These markets may be "free", but they are not efficient, in fact they are arguably corrupt. The economists have also figured out what side their bread is buttered on.

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> I'm not sure the government is actively killing it... they just aren't doing anything about the oligopolies and collusion that have always developed in these sort of situations.

They are implementing regulations that put smaller butcher shops out of business. That said, the regulations may be good, but if the burden is too high .... well you have a problem.

I'm not exactly sure either. But my observations of politicians serving big business over small producers by dismantling anti-competitive regulations in several industries makes me think that it is almost a certainty.

Accidents of policy do happen, but would you agree that it is suspicious that 4 food packing companies are making massive profits on such a 40-year-old accident and no one has thought to just fix it yet?

I mean, corporations are created by government regulations. If you don't have a law which specifies how they work, they don't exist.

So if you have a body of law which enables the creation of these things, details how they are managed, and then they develop into oligopolies, this is not something that happens "naturally" -- it's a deliberate result produced by whoever controls those laws.

The voters have the power to curtail influence of big ag and other corporate oligarchies, but that requires not being afraid of voting for leftist ideas like class consciousness, unions, and stronger government regulation on big businesses.

Can you show me some examples of leftist ideas helping small businesses by regulating big businesses?

Antitrust?

I think it's more complicated than a simple left/right dichotomy. Bernie Sanders' biggest accomplishments as a Senator were giving billions of dollars to big ag as corporate subsidies (often to the dairy industry which donated heavily to his campaign). Giving taxpayer money to big ag is similar to the military industrial complex in that both sides of the political spectrum further it.

And it's many of the same constituents (i.e., farmers in red states) voting for the party of "small government".

The federal government sets the higher and higher standards for butchers. It’s not the smaller local governments causing the issue.

How is big ag not representing an efficient market compared to thousands of small disconnected farms? In this sense thinking about efficiency being a measure of how open and accessible information is concerning said market. I can think of a few different pro/con angles to the assertion. Curious what's on your mind.

Big Ag in this case is meat packing. Perhaps you're referring to the largest cattle ranches as well? Demonstrably, profits are going only to the middle men while farmers margins are squeezing to 0 driving them out of business... that will eventually raise actual supply prices once only the largest few "most efficient" ranchers left, but then those prices will be entirely passed on to consumers not the processors/middle men.

So supply prices rise as production falls... to the monopoly maximum marginal profit extracted from the consumer, just as predicted!

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