Does it really matter to the consumer if all businesses are owned by the same owner or not if they act as if they were?   

Monopolies and cartels are enemies of the people effectively eliminating competitive pricing while increasing inflation.   

Technology is being used to eliminate free trade and competition as it is now possible to assess market trends virtually instantaneously and adjust prices dynamically.   

Because of the unmitigated greed factor as a result of the de-Christianization of America no longer do merchants set prices based on their cost of doing business.   Rather they set prices based on how much the market can bear.   

If there is no price alternative, then the price will rise until the demand stops.   

The people are not served when the price increases to the point that they stop using a product or service.   

Collusion has an inflationary effect.   If a given merchant knows that his product or service can only be had at a given price then he is confident that raising his price to that of the market will not reduce his sales while increasing his revenue.   

How the free market is supposed to work:
   ➛ seller determines the cost of production per unit
   ➛ seller sets the price per unit based on the cost per unit
   ➛ buyer decides whether or not the selling price is worth his dollars
   ➛ if price is reasonable, demand goes up
   ➛ increased demand allows the seller to raise prices
   ➛ increased margins brings in more producers/sellers (competition)
   ➛ more sellers causes the price to go down or at least stabilize

Again, if the sellers are colluding the force that leads to price reductions, or at least stabilization, is eliminated.   As a result, prices increase regardless of the production cost.   

Because prices are increasing, wages for the laborers to produce product must increase.   When more money is available to consumers to purchase there is incentive to raise prices.   

And so we end up in an inflationary vortex.   That vortex will inevitably undermine the very economy that served both buyers and sellers.   

How do we address the issue of collusion?   

We might as well ask, "How do we address the issue of greed?"

Unfortunately, the technology cat is out of the bag.   Information is power and information is now pervasive.   

We used to be able to shop around and find the 'best' price for an item.   That resulted in the 'efficient' provider getting more business and the 'inefficient' provider getting less business.   So, this encouraged efficiency and self-control (greed suppression) on the supplier side.   

Now, shopping around often results in a waste of time, as all suppliers are charging the same amount (collusion), with the buyer eventually submitting to the supplier manipulated market price.   

In an inflationary cycle, an amoral merchant will sell old stock based on the per unit price of his latest shipment, reaping large margins on that old stock, while a moral merchant will sell old stock at the old price and raise prices when the old stock is depleted.   

This moral constraint served the consumer while not hurting the provider.   

So much for moral merchants.   Most are now opportunists.   

Since moral restraint is no longer a mitigating factor in the market what are we left with in terms of stopping the inflationary cycle?   

The laws of economics cannot be thwarted.   

In order for prices to decrease
   ➛ there must be a decrease in the cost per unit to produce in a competitive market
   ➛ there is a reduction in demand

Technology has enabled the cost to produce electronic devices to decrease so the price has decreased for those devices.   Because those devices are produced in a competitive market the cost savings are passed on to the consumers.   

Should electronic device producers start colluding, the price will go up until the demand stops.   

Government has a responsibility to protect the market from monopolies, cartels and collusion as an aspect of its fundamental charge to promote general welfare.   For many years it did a reasonable job of this.   

However, information access, instantaneous communication and digitally controlled sale points make it unwieldy for a court action to intervene such as happened with Standard Oil, American Tobacco Company, and AT&T.   

What about a BigBrother Digital System - A computer system monitoring communications and market trends for everything and using its own power to set prices?   

So, in the absence of moral restraint and BigBrother there seems to be no way we can save the free-market capitalist system that has brought about our prosperity.   

'In the absence of moral restraint?'

Individually and societally we will all end up in hell without moral restraint.   

The only solution to our economic problem is the same solution as that for our mental, emotional, relational, community and national problems -
Jesus Christ

This is why God Himself came to earth - to save us from ourselves.   History is replete with stories of how human beings destroy each other.   

It is only in the last 100 years that we have had the ability to physically destroy all of humanity with bombs and in the last 20 years the ability to destroy ourselves digitally.   

Unlike the bomb-threat which is controlled by a relatively few people, the Digital Threat is in the hands of billions of people and is therefore uncontrollable.   

In the next few years we will be brought to the point of economic annihilation because of the Digital Threat.   The Beast identified in the Book of Revelation will attempt to solve the threat using a heavy-handed Digital Threat - his mark, name or number uniquely identifying every individual and controlling their assets while also controlling every merchant and every product and every price in the global market.   

Unfortunately, many will trust the Beast to manage the unmanageable and surrender themselves to his Digital System which is the mother of all Digital Threats.   

No, there is no real solution to our economic problem unless we repent and turn to Christ Jesus who will deliver us from our selfishness, greed and lust and give us a new nature - His nature.