E12: The Price Spreads Report, pt 2 - Retail as our Distribution System

Monopolies Killed My Hometown

In today's episode I dive into Chapter 7 of the Report of the Royal Commission on Price Spreads. This chapter is all about the 1934 Canadian retail scene and the impact of mass buyers, e.g. chain stores and department stores, on smaller retailers, producers and manufacturers. In case you couldn't guess - it wasn't good. This chapter is titled 'Distribution' and got me thinking of our retail system as the distribution network for our producers and manufacturers. Looking at our retailers as the national distribution network caused me to think of retail as essential infrastructure just like streets, railroads, water and sewer lines, and power lines. Allowing anyone to dominate any of these pieces of infrastructure allows them to extract excess fees and expenses from others. We've let a handful of companies dominate our retail scene again. We need to reform our competition laws to free our retail scene from these dominant players.

Links from today's episode:

• Chapter 7 of the Royal Commission on Price Spreads
• California accuses Amazon of stifling competition
• 2021 Suez Canal obstruction
• Dayles to close
• The CSCA Retail 100 (2021)
• Why we failed to save small businesses
• The Hockey Sweater