Since the beginning of the nuclear age, literally billions of dollars have been spent paying incredibly smart people to model all aspects of nuclear war, including the chain of escalation under uncertainty.
Not to discount the importance of this risk, but we’re not likely to sleepwalk into it, barring a collapse in strategic & operational competence in planning (yeah, yeah) that would make MANY risks dangerously severe.
There are several examples already of the modeling leading to systems that all incorrectly handled faults and pointed toward nuclear war as the correct next action. Each of these times _so far_ a human has gone against the strategic planning and operational competence you're talking about and decided personally to get more information before killing millions of people (and they were all correct so far!)
Diluting or delegating decision making to committees, processes, models, or AI all have essentially the same shape.
We can either appreciate how lucky we've been so far and actually learn from these near-doomsdays or we can choose to keep rolling the dice with our eyes covered.
I don’t think it was all that absurd. IIRC Portugal was already flirting with a system like that at the time.
ISP’s wanted websites to pay them a fee in order to be accessible or at least not throttled, while also wanting customers to pay a fee to access sites/access them without being throttled. At least that’s how I remember it, it has been quite some time since I really went down that rabbit hole.
There was a cottage industry in elaborating the theory that Bush and his administration were unnecessarily caught flat-footed or even knew the attacks were imminent.
He seemed more interested in publicity and exaggerating his own bureaucratic importance than being objective—tendencies the political opposition and media were in no mood to criticize.
HTML diverged from SGML pretty early on. Various standards over the years have attempted to specify it as an application of SGML but in practice almost nobody properly conformed to those standards. HTML5 gave up the pretence entirely.
Everything that has and will happen due to poor working conditions after he broke the rail strike in 2022. The cause celebre was the East Palestine derailment, but conditions are still unconscionable, and it's hard to conceive of a situation where rail laborers are overworked and under-supported doesn't result in more, and worse, incidents like that one. And then, of course, there are the knock-on environmental and economic effects.
It's not the only objectionable thing Biden's administration is solely responsible for, just the one that came to mind.
Your taxi crashes because the driver skipped brake maintenance and his insurance doesn't reimburse you for your hospital costs because commercial transportation isn't covered. Sure would be nice to have some minimum requirements for taxis.
The moral issue is when the executives at Uber know with certainty that their driver compensation and incentives push drivers to neglect required maintenance on their vehicles.
Much in the same way tobacco companies knew for a long time how addictive and harmful smoking was.
And how Facebook knows they let their advertisers scam their users, and the way social media was pushing teen suicides higher. They knew and kept pushing policies which made the problem worse. All so they could collect bigger compensation packages.
Would they risk a taxi ride if they knew that Uber failed to properly background check a driver, who later kidnapped and raped one of his passengers, and Uber's response was to hire private investigators to dig up personal information on the victim in an attempt to discredit her? [1]
Small but significant. A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller comes immediately to mind. (And readers of this thread who did appreciate the religious themes of Hyperion may be interested.)
I had recommended Hyperion to a friend, and they loved it. I recommended Canticle as a follow-up and they hated it. I never figured out how that can be.
> The policy and spirit of the California antitrust laws are to promote the free play of competitive market forces and the lower prices to consumers that result. Amazon, the dominant online retail store in the United States, has violated the policy, spirit, and letter of those laws by imposing agreements at the retail and wholesale level that have prevented effective price competition across a wide swath of online marketplaces and stores.
The linked-to article concerns a possible preliminary injunction related to that antitrust case.
You don’t need to be a monopoly for anti-trust law to come into play. Airlines can’t collude on pricing, for example, even though no single airline is a monopoly.
Yes. And? There's no claim that Amazon is part of a price-fixing cartel or other collusion.
A pure monopoly is one where there is a single seller or provider. The US grants limited-time monopoly power to a new patent holder, and USPS has a monopoly on traditional letter delivery within the United States, for examples. A pure monopoly is therefore not necessarily illegal.
"In a legal context, the term monopoly is also used to describe a variety of market conditions that are not monopolies in the truest sense. For instance, the term monopoly may be referring to instances where: ... There are many buyers or sellers, but one actor has enough market share to dictate prices (near monopolies)"
That use certainly seems appropriate in the context of Amazon's ability to dictate prices, as described in California's complaint, yes?
malfist literally wrote "near monopoly power", which is not the same thing as claiming that "Amazon is a monopoly".
You asked malfist 'In what sense does Amazon have “near monopoly power”?'
I answered that question. The state of California claims Amazon has enough market share to dictate prices, making it a near monopoly, and it abuses those near monopoly powers in violation of California anti-trust laws. California doesn't need to demonstrate that Amazon is a pure monopoly because that is irrelevant, and not true.
I farther pointed out that even using the term "monopoly" without the "near" qualifier can mean "There are many buyers or sellers, but one actor has enough market share to dictate prices (near monopolies)", with citation.
Which means your statement "Amazon is a monopoly" is a correct summary of the issue, even if those injunction request and complaint don't use those terms.
It seems you think the term "monopoly" can only ever be applied to pure monopolies. You seem to be confusing the economic and legal definitions. Quoting the introduction paragraph from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly
> In economics, a monopoly is a single seller. In law, a monopoly is a business entity that has significant market power, that is, the power to charge overly high prices, which is associated with unfair price raises.
This thread concerns a lawsuit, so the legal definition is the most relevant.
Is Walmart a “near monopoly”? How about Costco? They both have significant pricing power over their suppliers. How would you differential them from Amazon, if at all?
If we’re using your definition and not anything directly alleged in the CA complaint…
Do you understand what malfist wrote by "near monopoly power", and agree that it's a correct description of California's anti-trust lawsuit?
If not, what do you not understand?
As to your new set of questions, do you mean my personal beliefs, or do you mean the process by which the courts determine if an organization is abusing monopoly power, or to you mean an actual court decision? I'll answer all three.
Personally, yes, these companies abuse their near monopoly power. The failure to enforce the Robinson–Patman Act, the de-fanging of the FTC and consumer protection agencies, and the post-Borkian re-casting of antitrust law to "consumer welfare", has, IMHO, devastated the American free market resulting in a centralized command economy dominated by a handful of megacorporations.
Nor am I alone in this belief. It is not hard to find articles like "Walmart’s Monopolization of Local Grocery Markets" at https://ilsr.org/article/independent-business/walmarts-monop... which, among other things, points out how the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department has, since the 1960s, greatly raised the threshold for what "highly concentrated" market capture means, and WalMart is extreme even by that definition.
The legal process is to identify the relevant market. This can neither be too narrow - the market for "RC Cola" is not "those who buy RC Cola" but also includes other colas - nor too large -- RC Cola is not really interchangeable with milk, even though both are liquids which people drink.
If 99% of the people drink RC Cola, that could be because they love the taste, and are willing to pay more for it. (This is the premise of the Borkian view that monopolies are a direct and visible expression of consumer choice.) The anti-trust case must therefore also show there was abuse of its market position. That is what California's complaint does by describing many cases of third-party sellers unwilling to offer lower prices elsewhere, for fear of retaliation by Amazon. (The "consumer welfare" interpretation wrongly, IMO, rejects the idea that vendor concerns like this are part of antitrust law.)
There's probably more, but I'm a programmer, not a lawyer. I only know about these details because of the Microsoft antitrust lawsuit and commentary about the influence of Lina Khan on the FTC.
"A newly unredacted FTC complaint shows that PepsiCo and Walmart worked together to rig grocery pricing, drive up pricing at competitors and protect Walmart’s dominance. Internal PepsiCo documents reveal a coordinated strategy to give Walmart better wholesale prices, penalize independent and regional grocers that tried to lower their prices and preserve Walmart’s “price gap” by pushing rivals’ shelf prices up."
but then having it dropped voluntarily by the Trump/Ferguson FTC.
Which is why these sorts of things are now taken up on state courts, like California for Amazon, or New York (see Gelbspan v. Pepsico and Walmart at https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/mopabybynva/...). That does use the word "monopoly" and "monopolist", and describes the SSNIP test as the Hypothetical Monopoly Test used to determine if the relevant market is well-defined.
So if you are looking for actual court cases which have determined this, you either haven't been paying attention to the topic (completely understandable!), or you are a willing supporter of the Chicago School and the billionaire class which gain power by promoting it.
I guess I’m looking for a definition of the market for which Amazon holds a “near monopoly” and the criteria for establishing that designation.
It can’t be because 99% of people shop at Amazon to the exclusion of other retailers, because they don’t. Indeed, Amazon’s share of aggregate retail spending is quite low.
The response has been, roughly, “There are a bunch of court cases where these things are hashed out, and Amazon’s name has come up.”
OK, but as I said to begin with, antitrust is not just about monopoly power.
What monopoly powers does Amazon hold? At what point did they acquire them (roughly) looking back to their founding 30 years ago?
Maybe frame this the other way: If Amazon is only a “near monopoly”, what would have to happen to drop the “near”? What weight is that word carrying?
Then you need a primer in competition and anti-trust law.
The steps are to identify the relevant market and show abuse of market power - abuse as defined by antitrust law. The relevant market is not "aggregate retail spending". The California complaint goes into details about how online sales are not interchangeable with brick and mortar stores, something I mentioned earlier.
Determining abuse is not a simple plug&chug exercise.
It's not "99%", but such levels are a political decision about how what is fair and what is unfair market power. I pointed to the ISLR page, and mentioned how the threshold for concerns about market concentration has increased. Here's the full paragraph:
> Even by the permissive standards of today’s Justice Department, Walmart’s market power is considered extreme. Under guidelines established by the department’s Antitrust Division in 2010, markets in which one corporation captures more than 50 percent of revenue are defined as “highly concentrated.” (The agency has repeatedly raised this threshold since the 1960s, including sharply increasing it in 2010. These guidelines are used to evaluate mergers.)
My response has been "here are complaints which go into the details that you've asked about. You should read them to understand their arguments."
> but as I said to begin with, antitrust is not just about monopoly power.
And I completely agreed with you. However, for this specific case of Amazon, the California complaint can correctly be interpreted as concerning abuse of monopoly power, even if California never used that term. Because they don't need to use that term.
> What monopoly powers does Amazon hold?
Addressed in the complaint.
> At what point did they acquire them (roughly) looking back to their founding 30 years ago?
Why does that matter? When did Standard Oil become a monopoly? I doubt the Supreme Court of Ohio had to determine a rough date before being able to issue a breakup order.
> what would have to happen to drop the “near”?
Why does it matter?
I've already pointed out that economics and law use different definitions of "monopoly". Adding the qualifier "near" ensures that "monopoly" isn't misread as the economics definition of being a (pure) monopoly.
Determining abuse is not a simple plug&chug exercise.
I’m not asking about abuse, I’m asking about monopoly. As I’m sure you’re aware, it’s possible to become a monopoly through legitimate competitive action, and indeed similarly preserve that monopoly without violating anti-trust law.
So again: Why is Amazon a “near monopoly”? You go on for pages and pages through multiple comments that amount to, “Because California alleges that they are”—despite California not using that word, just words about anti-competitive practices that you claim are the same thing. I deny that claim. I believe California is alleging Amazon is engaging in anti-competitive behavior that would be anti-competitive behavior whether they’re a monopoly, near monopoly, or no monopoly at all.
Please do me the honor of remembering that I gave examples of monopolies and near monopolies which are not considered abusive, and linked to https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/monopoly with more details.
"However, the existence of a very high market share does not always mean consumers are paying excessive prices since the threat of new entrants to the market can restrain a high-market-share firm's price increases. Competition law does not make merely having a monopoly illegal, but rather abusing the power that a monopoly may confer, for instance through exclusionary practices"
> Why is Amazon a “near monopoly”?
Again, the lawsuit is that Amazon is abusing their power as a "high-market-share firm". This is widely characterized as Amazon being a monopoly. I have provided many links which support my interpretation.
> I deny that claim.
I can't help but conclude you are being obstinate. https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/monopoly : "A monopoly is when a single company or entity creates an unreasonable restraint of competition in a market."
If you want to argue over what "unreasonable" means, go ahead. But denying terms which date back to the 1800s[1] is parading your own stubbornness.
What do you define as "monopoly" or "near monopoly", and when should the law step in to restrain a monopolist? Can you demonstrate external support for your interpretation?
Because as it stands, it seems like you don't understand the basics of the topic, but believe you do, and are doubling-down, unwilling to consider that you don't.
> I believe California is alleging Amazon is engaging in anti-competitive behavior that would be anti-competitive behavior whether they’re a monopoly, near monopoly, or no monopoly at all.
I assume you read how California claims Amazon violated the Cartwright Act. This requires an ability to harm market-wide competition, in a properly defined relevant market. That's why the complaint goes through the effort of defining the market, and presents evidence of market-wide harm to that market. This is why I've been careful to insist that being a monopoly isn't the problem - abusing monopoly power is the problem.
If Amazon had no monopoly at all, which I'll interpret as having little market power, then it does not have that ability, so cannot violate the Cartwright Act, so would not be in the complaint, which again tells me that you need to learn more about antitrust law. (Note that I am specifically addressing the part of the complaint which can be regarded as relevant to explaining how "near monopoly" is a correct characterization.)
"That is, Monopoly is a kind of Commerce, in buying, selling, changing or bartering, usurped by a few, and sometimes but by one person, and forestalled from all others, to the gaine of the Monopolist, and to the Detriment of other men."
"The parts then of a Monopolie are twaine, The restraint of the liberty of Commerce to some one or few: and the setting of the price at the pleasure of the Monopolian to his private benefit, and the prejudice of the publique. Upon which two Hinges every Monopoly turneth."
California claims that Amazon restrains the liberty of third-party sellers to set prices which do not benefit Amazon, and which prejudice the public, making Amazon a monopolist even when using a 400 year old definition.
I dunno, going in with the starting assumption that Matt Stoller is innumerate and/or will twist statistics to support his otherwise specious arguments is not a terrible approach.
On the particulars of this number, he seems to be close enough, but it’s not nearly as shocking with any context: The average American household Walmart spend is comparable, Apple captures almost half that with a handful of devices and services.
Not to discount the importance of this risk, but we’re not likely to sleepwalk into it, barring a collapse in strategic & operational competence in planning (yeah, yeah) that would make MANY risks dangerously severe.
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