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Comment by almost_usual | Hacker News Reader

These arguments of “monopolies are OK because China does it” are slippery slopes to authoritarianism.

The arguments that "we should break up these companies because they're too successful" are slippery slopes to authoritarianism.

The problem with the modern economy is that companies can become “too successful” using underhanded and ethically questionable practices. They influence the government to pass laws that can strengthen their hold or eliminate competition entirely. They hide behind a wall of government when it is convenient and act like angels when the people want the government to break them up.

I don’t know what the answer is, but rewarding corruption and discouraging success are not feasible in the long term. Both arguments above seem legitimate.

>They influence the government to pass laws that can strengthen their hold or eliminate competition entirely. They hide behind a wall of government when it is convenient and act like angels when the people want the government to break them up.

>I don’t know what the answer is, but rewarding corruption and discouraging success are not feasible in the long term.

Maybe the answer is limiting the government's ability to pass laws that unfairly privilege one company over others. Power that doesn't exist can't be misused.

The United States has been breaking up monopolies longer than China has been the CCP.

We still haven’t become an authoritarian government like China.

But the US government is becoming more authoritarian every year.

The history of labor rights in the US should indicate just how bad things will get if companies aren't curtailed.

That's not my argument. My argument is that if you permit a Chinese monopoly, as the person I replied to suggests, and then break it up, also as they suggest, you would royally fuck the US domestic economy.

And government involvement in the free market is not a slippery slope to authoritarianism?

The same government led by a president who threatened to “shut down Twitter”?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com