Monopolies Killed My Hometown

"Attack on American Free Enterprise System", or better known as The Powell Memo. Lewis Powell wrote this memo for the education committee of the American Chamber of Commerce two months before he was nominated to sit on the US Supreme Court.

I looked at this American memo for two main reasons. First, Canada tends to follow the economic path laid by the US. Second, in the last episode I talked about ecosystems. I said the largest trees can't change the rules to benefit themselves, but businesses can. This memo provides the outline for how the business community worked to change the rules for their benefit over the last 40-50 years. Knowing this history is relevant to the conversation we're going to have about Competition Policy in Canada.

Other people have more scholarly reviews and analysis of this memo. I view this as Powell invoking a moral panic to get the business community to fight back. I break down why I think this is the case.

Show Notes

"Attack on American Free Enterprise System", or better known as The Powell Memo. Lewis Powell wrote this memo for the education committee of the American Chamber of Commerce two months before he was nominated to sit on the US Supreme Court.

I looked at this American memo for two main reasons. First, Canada tends to follow the economic path laid by the US. Second, in the last episode I talked about ecosystems. I said the largest trees can't change the rules to benefit themselves, but businesses can. This memo provides the outline for how the business community worked to change the rules for their benefit over the last 40-50 years. Knowing this history is relevant to the conversation we're going to have about Competition Policy in Canada.

Other people have more scholarly reviews and analysis of this memo. I view this as Powell invoking a moral panic to get the business community to fight back. I break down why I think this is the case.

Some links from today's episode:

What is Monopolies Killed My Hometown?

Do you wonder why small towns, small businesses and people seem to be falling behind and you don’t know why? Feeling helpless about whether any of us can do anything to halt the decline of the places we love? Well, we know a secret. Our society fought the same battles about 100 years ago, and small towns won.

Join Andrew Cameron, the founder of the Center for Small Town Success and small business owner, every other week as he rediscovers our Canadian Anti-Monopoly tradition. The goal is to learn how we successfully fought back against Monopolies in the 1900s so we can restore power to small towns, small businesses and individuals today.

Listen to this podcast if you want to learn more about Canadian Competition Policy and to join the Anti-Monopoly movement. #freeboswell #cdnpoli