I swear people look at this these mergers the wrong way. The people who get squeezed are less likely to be the consumers and more likely to be the producers.
Food is going to get more expensive, lower quality and supplied by less producers.
This is America, where muscular middlemen squeeze out the middle class so that capital flows to the top.
Margin for producers? Not gonna happen.
And for consumers? raise prices and lower portion sizes until profits start to decline.
Rent-seeking is the American dream
I assume it is everyone’s dream.
In either case, there might be some people that would eschew that, but I doubt the population of people that would accept (or dream about it) it is restricted to “Americans”.
Or what's the probability of creating one in your lifetime, from the bottom? That's what those in debt are thinking, that's what those without a stake in the profits are angry about.
I'm just saying that's not my dream (to be born rich).
People use “rent seeking” to mean “people making money in ways I don’t like”.
And having lived in other countries I benefit greatly as a consumer being able buy things cheaper at places like Walmart.
- The producers
- The consumers
- The employees
It's easy to picture consumers being squeezed the least by this, but maybe not.
Plus all of the comments here are discussing the impact of the merger, and not the highway robbery that it identifies as a core problem. Frustrating.