Listen to highlights from a recent ILSR event called “The Progressive Fight for Small Business” featuring Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal and White House Advisor Tim Wu. … Read More
On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, Jess Del Fiacco is joined by John Farrell and guest Ari Peskoe who is the director of the energy law initiative at Harvard Law School. They discuss the acts that Congress has passed to increase (but hasn’t) competition in electric utilities, the four orders the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) ruled between 1996 and 2011, and the cost utility’s evading competitive processes has on consumers. … Read More
In Episode #83 of the Community Broadband Bits podcast, we bring you Barry Lynn to talk about the direct and indirect threats that make market consolidation dangerous. There are many threats from monopolies and many are much more dangerous to a free society than higher prices. Lynn is a senior fellow at the New America Foundation and author … Read More
Bill of Rights vs. Concentrated Power by David Morris Institute for Local Self-Reliance March 2, 1999 – published in St. Paul Pioneer Press One of the White House’s priorities is to enact a Patients Bill of Rights that, among other elements, requires Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) to develop grievance and appeals procedures. Meanwhile, Senators Ron Wyden … Read More
Populism Circa 1999 by David Morris Institute for Local Self-Reliance February 9, 1999 – published in St. Paul Pioneer Press The election of Jesse Ventura set off a flurry of punditry about the meaning of the word “populist”. Governor Ventura certainly fits to a “v” the first part of Webster’s New World Dictionary’s definition of a … Read More
The Curse of Bigness by David Morris Institute for Local Self-Reliance October 6, 1998 – published in St. Paul Pioneer Press At the beginning of this century, American leaders railed against what Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis called the “curse of bigness”. Presidents, Senators, commentators all decried the pernicious effects concentrated economic power has on small … Read More
The Marketplace Wins: Choice Loses by David Morris Institute for Local Self-Reliance June 2, 1998 – published in St. Paul Pioneer Press It wasn’t supposed to end up like this. The free market system promised to bring us more choice, not less. Indeed, to most free enterprise advocates, choice is the most important feature of the … Read More
Size Matters by David Morris Institute for Local Self-Reliance April 21, 1998 – published in St. Paul Pioneer Press The announced marriage of Travelers Group and Citicorp, and the wave of megamergers it inspired, once again puts size into the policy spotlight. Size matters. But contrary to what the bolsters of bigness promise, when it comes … Read More
Economic Giantism Threatens Democracy by David Morris Institute for Local Self-Reliance January 27, 1998 – published in St. Paul Pioneer Press The numbers are numbing. In 1997, a trillion dollars in mergers took place in this country. USA Today reports that health care providers are merging at a rate of 3.3 per day. The Big Five … Read More
