In article , "J. Clarke" wrote:
On Wed, 06 Dec 2006 20:23:31 +0000, Brian Henderson wrote:

On Tue, 5 Dec 2006 18:41:01 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
wrote:

So what you're saying is that Wal Mart or Home Depot moved into Bixby, drove
out all of the mom-n-pop businesses (which has been demonstrated to be a
falisy, but we'll assume it for the sake of the discussion), and then having
successfully closed down all of these salt of the earth businesses, pulled
out of Bixby themselves?

I still think it's amazing how many people completely misunderstand
capitalism. Walmart and HD do not drive *ANYONE* out of business. If
anything, it's the CUSTOMERS who choose, of their own free will, to
shop at Walmart and HD, that do it. Walmart and HD don't herd
customers at gunpoint into their stores, they simply offer lower
prices, because of their size and buying power, and people make the
CHOICE to shop there. So anyone who claims that Walmart and HD drive
anyone out of business is a bald-faced liar.

Says the Wal-Mart apologist. Kind of hard to compete with an operation
that is several orders of magnitude larger than yours unless you can find
some way other than price to differentiate yourself, and that is
difficult with mass-market consumer goods.

Better service is certainly one way that small operations can compete with the
big box stores. Some small businesses understand that, some don't -- and it's
the latter, IME, that can't survive competition with the big boxes.

And if they moved out of Bixby, it's likely they couldn't make enough
money to make a profit, what do you expect them to do? They leave and
anyone else who wants to start a business again is welcome to.

It's called competition. It's the cornerstone of the economic system of
capitalism.

Which system in its unfettered state proved to be an unmitigated disaster
hence the Sherman Antitrust Act and other legislation.

Nonsense -- the Sherman Antitrust Act bans ANTIcompetitive business practices.
It was passed specifically to put an end to businesses conspiring to stifle
competition.

--
Regards,
Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

It's time to throw all their damned tea in the harbor again.