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dmix · 2019-02-10 · Original thread
The rules always get written to control the big companies like FB, despite the fact the laws effect the whole marketplace of thousands of companies of different sizes. But big companies like FB have enough lawyers and influence and never really change. Meanwhile the laws cripple all sorts of harmless small-medium sized companies, including potential future better competitors to FB. And the laws stay law for decades before they get fixed, if ever.

There are countless examples of this in other industries. Some of the laws following the 2008 financial crisis are a good example which reduced the market place of hundreds of small banks who couldn’t operate with the new rules and further solidified the positions of the 5 mega banks. So much for ending “too big to fail”.

Idealism of “what should be done” meets reality of always historically ends up happening. If you’re interested in this topic Thomas Sowell included a hundred examples of well intentioned laws having the opposite effect and making problems either worse or stopping the one problem and generating far worse ones (usually after a period of time when every claims the regulation a success and moves on, before the reality of the situation reveals itself).

https://www.amazon.com/Wealth-Poverty-Politics-Gordon-Tulloc...

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