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Comment by dragontamer | Hacker News Reader

"Mono" means ONE. Literally the number 1. Monopoly generally means ONE supplier that controls the entire marketplace.

There are other forms of market failure relating to a small group having too much power in the market: Monopoly, Cartel, Oligopoly, Monopsony, etc. etc.

Oligopoly or Cartel are far closer to what the article is describing. To use the word "Monopoly" here is simply incorrect English.

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Etymology provides a good basis for guessing the general meaning of words you don't know, but it's hardly the authority on nuances of meaning. Many words have taken tangentially-related or even opposite senses from their roots in other languages.

The meanings of words shifts based on their usage. I'm old enough to recognize that the meaning of words change.

Nonetheless, economic principles have a precise, technical definition for Monopoly, Duopoly, Monopsony, Oligopoly, Cartel, and Oligopsony.

Each situation requires a different policy to handle. So its important to choose the right word to describe any particular problem.

Oh yeah, I agree with the conclusion. Weakening of technical terms makes clear discussion of these abstract topics in a casual context exponentially more difficult.

I just don't see that argument-from-etymology is a productive way to get there since it doesn't seem to generalize.

yes, a monopoly is dominated by one large supplier (or in the case of a buyer, monopsony). but that doesn't mean that there is only one market participant. it doesn't even mean that the dominant player has the majority market share.

like any field of study, people apply words outside of the technical application and meaning gets diluted the further a person is from the field (economics). just look at how superhero movies use the word 'dimension'. =)

but yes, without examining the industry in more detail, oligopoly is the safer initial assumption.

Literal meaning of the word is absolutely irrelevant. Historically monopoly was about granted status, but it's mostly a theoretical concept today, where everyone is in the middle between monopoly and perfect competition. You can say that if it's not competitive enough, it's a monopoly.

> You can say that if it's not competitive enough, it's a monopoly.

A market that is not competitive enough is an 'oligopoly'. That's the word you want. Why do you want to move the definition of 'monopoly' when we already have the word 'oligopoly'?

I don't want to move the definition, my definition is fine and is shared among many people. Yours is the one I think is wrong. You shouldn't imply that oligopoly is not a form of monopoly. It absolutely is.

> You shouldn't imply that oligopoly is not a form of monopoly.

But the article said 'monopoly', not 'oligopoly'.

Monopoly is a form of oligopoly. But oligopoly is not a form of monopoly.

All monopolies are oligopolies. Not all oligopolies are monopolies.

This chicken situation is maybe an oligopoly. It isn't a monopoly.

If you think a situation with multiple supplies and limited competition is a monopoly, then I'd ask you... why do we also have the term oligopoly? What do you think the difference is?

You can argue that all laypeople should use the terms that specialists use, or you can accept that people use words differently and try to understand people when they write/speak.

The latter is far, far easier and actually achievable.

This is the first time I've encountered people using the word monopoly incorrectly like this. I'm not really minded to just roll over and accept wrong usage because a few other people object - the usage is wrong so they need to improve their English.

Also for what it's worth I don't believe the article author misunderstands the word monopoly. I think they abused it to get clicks.

> Where on earth did I imply oligopoly is not a form of monopoly?

> But oligopoly is not a form of monopoly.

This is wrong, sorry.

It's the other way around, since we are talking about market economies, not literal meanings of words.

What do you think a monopoly is? What would you definition be?

As I pointed out earlier, I think of markets on a scale between perfect competition and monopoly. Which I believe is common view. So anything can be described as monopoly if it's not competitive enough.

You don't need any specialized degree to distinguish between the two, and it is frankly not that difficult that laypeople would have difficulty grasping the difference. I prefer not to contribute to the declining precision of language whenever possible. I think saying that "an oligopoly is conceptually similar enough to a monopoly to use interchangeably" is a slide towards hyperbole. This kind of imprecision, but with a sinister bias towards the more extreme version of a word, is subtly making public discourse more polarizing and antagonistic.

Did you try checking the dictionary?

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/monopoly

Even better: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/oligopoly

Oligopoly _specifically_ describes what we have here. I learned a new word today.

From your link: "the exclusive possession or control of something", "a company or group that has such control".

You must be trolling.

I'm not. But I do find it interesting how some people here don't like certain definitions and claim they are wrong.

You're describing markets the ways journalists are joked[1] about describing guns. Except you're doubling down and saying "No, you're wrong. All assault rifles are AK-47s, everyone knows what I mean when I say an AK-47, you know, a gun that shoots bullets fast and stuff!"

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/3h74f3/a_journalists...

You're the one that linked the dictionary the says "or group"...

A "group" in a business sense isn't distinct, unrelated entities.

The company I work for is the "something something group".

You claim our definitions are wrong as well!

>Literal meaning of the word is absolutely irrelevant.

Well, to that I say: "Pelecie inoteso su erik anohot fete derera notel not. Toyino litifid ca yigo lece yevi vitod emefan berie nisur, cinim pociepem oce irimo alucetef cupara yonebup eroyifeh oponud."

If the literal definition of words is absolutely irrelevant, then this is a cogent argument that perfectly refutes your position.

> Historically monopoly was about granted status

Historically, monopoly was about single players taking over the economic system. There are other, better words to use if you aren't describing ONE powerful company.

Carnegie Steel Company. Rockefeller's Oil. Ma Bell. ONE supplier, across the entire USA.

You're not winning this argument from etymology (where Mono literally means one), or historical. Ma Bell's breakup was as recent as 1980s, this isn't some "ancient history" here, its modern US history.

Standard Oil was never a literal monopoly, there was always some competition. They had about 90% of the market at their peak, and it was down to about 70% when they were broken up.

True monopolies, e.g. Bell Telephone, local cable franchises, utilities, etc. are (almost?) always granted by the government.

You get local monopolies even if the government freely allows multiple companies to string wires.

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