Monopolized
Life in the Age of Corporate Power
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Beschreibung des Verlags
From the airlines we fly to the food we eat, how a tiny group of corporations have come to dominate every aspect of our lives—by one of our most intrepid and accomplished journalists
"If you're looking for a book . . . that will get your heart pumping and your blood boiling and that will remind you why we're in these fights—add this one to your list." —Senator Elizabeth Warren on David Dayen's Chain of Title
Over the last forty years our choices have narrowed, our opportunities have shrunk, and our lives have become governed by a handful of very large and very powerful corporations. Today, practically everything we buy, everywhere we shop, and every service we secure comes from a heavily concentrated market.
This is a world where four major banks control most of our money, four airlines shuttle most of us around the country, and four major cell phone providers connect most of our communications. If you are sick you can go to one of three main pharmacies to fill your prescription, and if you end up in a hospital almost every accessory to heal you comes from one of a handful of large medical suppliers.
Dayen, the editor of the American Prospect and author of the acclaimed Chain of Title, provides a riveting account of what it means to live in this new age of monopoly and how we might resist this corporate hegemony.
Through vignettes and vivid case studies Dayen shows how these monopolies have transformed us, inverted us, and truly changed our lives, at the same time providing readers with the raw material to make monopoly a consequential issue in American life and revive a long-dormant antitrust movement.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
American Prospect editor Dayen (Chain of Title) delivers a sweeping, deeply researched assessment of the adverse consequences of monopolies on American life. A chapter on the agricultural industry explains how the "concentrated animal feeding operations" of corporate hog farms put smaller competitors out of business, damage the environment, and endanger public health. Dayen also details how tech behemoths such as Google and Facebook degrade online journalism; how pharmaceutical companies prevent people from buying insulin and other essential medications at an affordable price; and how Amazon exploits contract delivery drivers and third-party sellers. Tracing the steady decline of antitrust enforcement across the past few decades, Dayen notes, for instance, that 51 airlines merged between 1979 and 1988, and that four major carriers now control more than 80% of U.S. routes. In the book's final chapter, he calls for the reinterpretation of existing antitrust laws "to cover the full spectrum of harms, beyond just consumer welfare," and describes the emergence of antimonopoly movements in the U.S. and abroad. Balancing copious data with profiles of workers and business owners, and writing in clear, accessible language, Dayen makes a persuasive argument that reining in big business should be a priority for American voters and policy makers. This is an incisive, irrefutable call to action.
