Google and Facebook control nearly 75 percent of the $73 billion market in digital advertising. The chemical giant Monsanto is able to dictate when and how farmers plant its seeds. A private equity firm in Brazil controls roughly half of the U.S. CVS and Walgreens have a virtual lock on the drugstore and pharmacy business. Matt Stoller lists the gross outcomes of that worldview:Įighty percent of seats on airplanes are sold by just four airlines. Naturally, that mindset leads to an economy which lacks robust levels of competition as capital becomes more and more concentrated.
Peter Thiel captured the sentiment of modern times perfectly when he approvingly wrote, “ monopoly is the condition of every successful business.” More than that, control of market share has become the desired outcome in every aspect of economic life - it is the logical conclusion of shareholder-driven capitalism. For far too long, Americans have acquiesced to an economy ordered by and for monopolies.
This is the sort of economic commentary we need right now. The cheaters edition follows the rules of classic Monopoly, except this version encourages players to break them…They encourage players to cheat in various ways, from collecting rent on another player’s property or stealing money from the bank. That’s some tragic irony - though it appears as if Hasbro is trying to draw attention to Monopoly’s original purpose by releasing a new “cheaters edition” this autumn (as seen above). Inequality remains breathtakingly high, poverty still exists at a startling rate in the wealthiest nation on earth, and her board game has become a celebration of the very economic practices it was designed to denounce.
Monopoly’s creator would look at today’s economic landscape and be disheartened. Shortly after producing the game, Maggie told a reporter, “In a short time, I hope a very short time, men and women will discover that they are poor because Carnegie and Rockefeller, maybe, have more than they know what do to with.”Ī long time has passed since then and it’s safe to say that Maggie’s hope has not been realized. Eventually, it ended up being the precursor to the game-which-nobody-ever-finishes, Monopoly. So she constructed the Landlord’s Game, which intended to educate players on the rules and regulations of realty and taxation. The year was 1904, and Lizzie Maggie wanted to create a board game that acted as “ a harsh criticism of wealth disparity.” Upset by the the inequality around her, Maggie aspired to ridicule and condemn the dire outcomes of unbridled capitalism.
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