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Post a Comment On: Steve Sailer: iSteve

"Cartel monopsony power and antitrust laxity"

33 Comments -

1 – 33 of 33
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The main reason air travel is so inconvenient, expensive, and customer unfriendly is the allowance for all the airlines to merge with each other.

3/27/14, 6:27 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

So your searching for old cartel/monopoly articles?

Sowing the seeds of an up coming post on monopoly?

3/27/14, 6:41 PM

Anonymous anony-mouse said...

Doesn't the American ideal involve getting rich by starting your own business and not by working for someone else?

If there's a petroleum geologist who is being oppressed by the monopsonistic oil companies maybe he (or she) should go out wildcatting.

'Wildcatting' sounds more American than 'I think my paycheck is too small. Oh well.'

The same BTW is for employees of Apple, etc. You don't like what Steve Jobs is doing to you? Well then be Steve Jobs.

What's with this employee-philia?

3/27/14, 6:50 PM

Blogger Steve Sailer said...

Yeah, if you want to be paid fully for being in the offshore oil drilling business, build yourself an offshore oil rig, haul it out to sea, and start drilling!

3/27/14, 6:53 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

What with the KMeters? Are you a commie Steve?

How far is it miles?

3/27/14, 6:55 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Are you sure that nationalizing oil companies is such a bad idea ?

Ok, it doesn't work in Venezuela, but a lot of other things don't work there. Isn't it working out well in Norway though ?

AKAHorace

3/27/14, 7:06 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Lets first nationalize the cable and record industries and see how that works out.

3/27/14, 7:13 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

How far is it miles?

How far is it in furlongs?

3/27/14, 7:40 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

It was Chevron that merged with Texaco, not Shell. The resulting entity was called ChevronTexaco, but they've since dropped the "Texaco" part.

3/27/14, 7:58 PM

Anonymous JWS said...

Steve had some good posts about fracking last year. Not many people understand how critical the oil business is.

"Exxon" is a rebranding of Rockefeller's Standard Oil. The name was altered by corporate marketing jargon specialists in the 70's who thought "Standard Oil" had developed too many negative connotations.

Interesting that the company that was the biggest and most lucrative enterprise in the world in 1900 is still pretty much on top 115 years later.

Explosive growth in the oil and gas business is the invisible force that has renewed Russia's ability to bully its neighbors.

In the 1930s leftish intellectuals raved about Communism because of tremendous economic growth in the Soviet Union at the time, but really much of Soviet growth was just due to high oil prices and exploitation of newly discovered fields.

Just like in the 2010's an oil boom has made Texas look good, even though Tyler Cowen wants to give all the credit to wacky libertarian economics.

3/27/14, 8:23 PM

Anonymous Viga Noot said...

anony-mouse said... "The same BTW is for employees of Apple, etc. You don't like what Steve Jobs is doing to you? Well then be Steve Jobs.:

The days of starting and building your own software company are long over. In the 80's-90's, people could have a viable business running small firm that could grow. Software projects are now too complex and need to be carefully managed theses days.

3/27/14, 8:29 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is currently occurring in the Canadian oil patch. Oil companies claim that there is an insufficient number of professionals for the scheduled volume of facilities pending design and construction and so have lobbied government to expedite the accreditation of "foreign-trained professionals" (mostly Indians and Pakistanis, peoples with a stupendous regard for scruple). Of course, oil companies complain about shortages in technical expertise as they actively offshore engineering to India and China. Funny, eh?

3/27/14, 9:07 PM

Anonymous Dave Pinsen said...

It was a lot more expensive before deregulation. But it was also a lot nicer. Coach back then was more like business class in terms of service.

3/27/14, 9:14 PM

Anonymous Dave Pinsen said...

A friend's father, a former longtime Exxon engineer, had a nice second career consulting in the Middle East.

3/27/14, 9:16 PM

Anonymous Dave Pinsen said...

Esso (= S.O. = Standard Oil) is still used by Exxon in some foreign markets.

3/27/14, 9:18 PM

Anonymous Dave Pinsen said...

Facebook? Whatsapp? Klout? Etc.?

3/27/14, 9:19 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Yeah, if you want to be paid fully for being in the offshore oil drilling business, build yourself an offshore oil rig, haul it out to sea, and start drilling!"

Okay Steve, as soon as I get a few thousand dollars to spare in my bank account I'll get right on it. HaHaHa, I'm going to be rich, rich, rich!

3/27/14, 9:45 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Off topic, but Steve, how have you not been hired by the CIA yet?

The Turkish government was just exposed as planning a false flag attack to justify a Syrian invasion:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/27/us-syria-crisis-turkey-idUSBREA2Q17420140327

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-03-27/here-youtube-false-flag-attack-syria-clip-erdogan-wanted-banned

Keep up the phenomenal work. You're one of the only folks out there that seems to have a handle on what's going on in this crazy world of ours.

3/27/14, 10:37 PM

Blogger Whiskey said...

We could nationalize Hollywood. It could not possibly get any worse.

3/27/14, 10:50 PM

Anonymous yeh, yeh said...

@Viga Noot: WhatsApp begs to differ with you.

3/27/14, 11:12 PM

Anonymous JWS said...

@ Dave Pinsen:

Esso or Standard Oil sounds classier to me. Now it seems ironic they even changed their name in the first place. Who were they fooling? I guess they'd have to change their name every 5 years if they wanted to keep hiding from the sins of the past.

At the pace Facebook, Apple, and Google are going, they will drain away the value of their brands well Standard/Exxon ever did.

3/27/14, 11:40 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Viga Noot said...

anony-mouse said... "The same BTW is for employees of Apple, etc. You don't like what Steve Jobs is doing to you? Well then be Steve Jobs.:

The days of starting and building your own software company are long over. In the 80's-90's, people could have a viable business running small firm that could grow. Software projects are now too complex and need to be carefully managed theses days.

While this is true if you are trying to build something complex, smaller software companies are actually exploding in the indie game arena.

There have been many games recently done by small teams of 1-10 people that have done very well. There was recently a game on Steam that was done by only one person and was very popular.

There is even a documentary called Indie Game: The Movie that follows three very small teams who all made successful games.

Apps are along the same lines but not nearly as successful. In the top 100 lists for apps, something like 95/100 are done by already established big companies. With Flappy Bird being the obvious exception.

3/27/14, 11:42 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

One thing to keep in mind with all this is that the private companies we all love to deride account for a relatively small piece of global oil production (sharply up thanks fracking). I believe it is something like 10%, and the rest is done by the massive state owned oil companies which are the norm in the world. Think Sinopec, Gazprom, Total, Statoil, Pemex, Petrobras, the various middle eastern and Southeast Asia countries..account for the other 90%. I could be wrong on the numbers of course, but that's my 5am memory.

3/28/14, 3:23 AM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

If free market conservatives had any sense - the genuine ones not the corporate shills - they'd realize the cartel capitalism we have currently is the rich version of socialism.

.

"The Turkish government was just exposed as planning a false flag attack to justify a Syrian invasion:"

If they invade it'll be the Kurdish bits.

3/28/14, 5:12 AM

Anonymous anony-mouse said...

'Yeah, if you want to be paid fully from being in the offshore oil drilling business, build yourself an offshore oil rig, haul it out to sea, and start drilling'.

Whoa, Steve, there's still a lot of oil on land and people who have started very big energy businesses on their own.

www.forbes.com/sites/christopher helman/2013/03/04/americas-oil-and-gas-billionaires.

Why you yourself have mentioned T. Boone Pickens. And I'm sure you've heard of the Koch family.

Google 'Harold Hamm', 'Jeffrey Hildebrand', 'Dan Duncan', 'Robert Holding', 'Terence Pegula', and more.

All billionaires. None seem to be working in a cubicle for Exxon.

3/28/14, 6:10 AM

Blogger amendment_xxviii said...

http://blogs.wsj.com/atwork/2013/04/29/and-the-highest-paid-college-majors-are/

Here’s the list of top 10 majors, with starting salaries:
Petroleum Engineering: $93,500
Computer Engineering: $71,700
Chemical Engineering: $67,600
Computer Science: $64,800

30% more than 2nd place? I wish my industry would collude against me like that.

3/28/14, 6:51 AM

Anonymous Mr. Anon said...

"Anonymous said...

There have been many games recently done by small teams of 1-10 people that have done very well. There was recently a game on Steam that was done by only one person and was very popular."

Games are for children. Our economy seems increasingly to be built around the interests of twelve year olds, whether they be twelve, or thirty.

3/28/14, 6:59 AM

Anonymous Mr. Anon said...

"anony-mouse said...

Doesn't the American ideal involve getting rich by starting your own business and not by working for someone else?"

The American ideal is liberty. How is being a slave to a bunch of customers (as a small business owner) any better than being a slave to th company store?

3/28/14, 7:02 AM

Anonymous Hunsdon said...

JWS said: I guess they'd have to change their name every 5 years if they wanted to keep hiding from the sins of the past.

Hunsdon said: Ask Blackwater. I mean, Xe. I mean, Academi.

3/28/14, 10:59 AM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Here’s the list of top 10 majors, with starting salaries:

If you are lucky enough to find a job in that field once you graduate with the required degree.

3/28/14, 12:32 PM

Anonymous JWS said...

The list of top salaries posted by commenter amendment xviii emphasizes the fact that technology and oil are the two hot businesses right now.

Hiring competition has increased because everyone's doing well, therefore firms have a greater temptation to collude with one another.

3/28/14, 1:39 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Here’s the list of top 10 majors, with starting salaries:
Petroleum Engineering: $93,500"


One reason may be decreasing EROEI (Energy return on energy invested). Back in the day you could put up a derrick in Titusville or wherever, drill and find lots of oil - the energy return on the energy needed to build and run the derrick/drill was maybe 100-1. The gear was relatively cheap.

But the low-hanging fruit's been picked, and now the technology is very complex and expensive. Compare the cost of a rig/pipeline in the Gulf or North Sea with the cost of a straight-down derrick in Kuwait 50 years back. You now need

a) more engineers
b) more GOOD engineers because the costs of getting it wrong are greater. Ask BP.

Oil is expensive now because the costs of extraction are so much higher. Some of that money's going to stick to engineers.

3/28/14, 3:03 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...

It's not just the engineers getting rich. Every professional who touches oil tends to do well. For instance, the Big Four firms in Houston are in a constant headcount vortex because their people can make so much more working for oil companies. More to the point, it's probably the only major industry where you can make good money and not hate your life (looking at you, finance, law, and tech).

3/29/14, 9:56 PM

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