＜Zero to One＞２.perfect competition and monopoly

以你之姓@ 2024-04-05 05:05 59阅读 0赞

How much of the world is actually monopolistic? How much is truly competitive? It’s hard to say, because our common conversation about these matters is so confused. To the outside observer, all businesses can seem reasonably alike, so it’s easy to perceive only small differences between them.

![在这里插入图片描述][d5533e52f95b41b49814c7de3315070b.jpeg]

But the reality is much more binary than that. There’s an enormous difference between perfect competition and monopoly, and most businesses are much closer to one extreme than we commonly realize.  
![在这里插入图片描述][7aacf11fa81440b6826073108dd7af01.jpeg]

The confusion comes from a universal bias for describing market conditions in self-serving ways: both monopolists and competitors are incentivized to bend the truth.

Monopolists lie to protect themselves. They know that bragging about their great monopoly invites being audited, scrutinized, and attacked. Since they very much want their monopoly profits to continue unmolested, they tend to do whatever they can to conceal their monopoly—usually by exaggerating the power of their (nonexistent) competition.

Sometimes you do have to fight. Where that’s true, you should fight and win. There is no middle ground: either don’t throw any punches, or strike hard and end it quickly.

This advice can be hard to follow because pride and honor can get in the way. Hence Hamlet:

Exposing what is mortal and unsure

To all that fortune, death, and danger dare,

Even for an eggshell. Rightly to be great

Is not to stir without great argument,

But greatly to find quarrel in a straw

When honor’s at the stake.

For Hamlet, greatness means willingness to fight for reasons as thin as an eggshell: anyone would fight for things that matter; true heroes take their personal honor so seriously they will fight for things that don’t matter. This twisted logic is part of human nature, but it’s disastrous in business. If you can recognize competition as a destructive force instead of a sign of value, you’re already more sane than most. The next chapter is about how to use a clear head to build a monopoly business.

[d5533e52f95b41b49814c7de3315070b.jpeg]: https://image.dandelioncloud.cn/pgy_files/images/2024/04/04/c97ef9b9aa65455695319cd3f45b7797.jpeg
[7aacf11fa81440b6826073108dd7af01.jpeg]: https://image.dandelioncloud.cn/pgy_files/images/2024/04/04/cf8e2a21455544818e28603e71589260.jpeg