Capitalism

United Airlines, Monopoly/Oligopoly, The Natural Laws of Capitalism

In the US four airlines control over 80% of the seats and in many regional markets the competition veers towards a state of monopoly. There is simply no effective competitive controls on what the airlines can charge and under what conditions.This has lead to persistent high fares and a seemingly endless series of innovations in how many people can be jammed into a plane with as many extra charges tacked on for fewer and fewer amenities. —>> read more –>>

Books

NYTimes Book Review Misses Major Points About US Healthcare

Using a variety of tools and institutional arrangements every other developed country controls prices and healthcare budgets. They do not allow a one-sided market to focus on delivering as many procedures and prescriptions as possible without any systematic focus on health. To put the outrage of American healthcare in its true global setting: US healthcare spending compared to other developed countries and health outcomes relative to other developed countries. As the chart below demonstrates, the US spends more than 25% more than our closest competitor, Switzerland, and twice as much as most including japan, France, Australia and Canada. The health outcomes are woeful. We rank 42 in the world for longevity and 56th for infant mortality. —>> read more –>>

Capitalism

Thoughts on Standard Economics

I’ve been looking through Paul Krugman’s textbook Macroeconomics (Krugman and Wells, 4th edition, 2015) and came on Principle #2 – “The opportunity cost of an item—what you must give up in order to get it—is its true cost….The concept of opportunity cost is crucial to understanding individual choice because, in —>> read more –>>