The End of the Free Market
Americans may think we have a free market, one in which anyone can compete in the sale of goods or services. We do not. And have not for quite sometime. I am not an economist. But I am a historian, and am fully capable of seeing what has gone down. The end of the free market began in the late 19th Century. The Industrial Revolution as well as new technology like the telephone allowed large corporations to rise and some of these became monopolies. It all started with larger railroads buying up smaller ones in the 19th Century. Then the same happened with the banks. The government begin to see that there was no more such a thing as free competition. Smaller competitors were quickly eliminated through unfair trade practices. As a result there was the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890. It prohibited 1) anticompetitive agreements and 2) unilateral conduct that monopolizes or attempts to monopolize the relevant market. This fight against Big Business continued into the early 20th Century. Pre
