Omnivores

Imagine an anarchy of big corporate business taking over the government. The population says, hey, whatever; anything ought to work. The little businesses are supposed to fill in the cracks between what the big corporations make available. Theory is that in this anarchy if there is any human need whatsoever, there will be a business spring up to provide that need's fulfillment, for a price.

The big businesses secure ownership of select items of the myriad concepts and techniques that go into making any product or service; this is to protect their exclusive right to use the specific concepts and techniques. Each big business has ownership of its domain of those things it takes to create a product or service.

But each big business is required to maximize its profits, to fulfill the demands of its stockholders who only care about the money, and have no interest in the products that made the money for them. The demand to only make the most money, means that the company can only make those products and provide those services that make the most money for them. The products that would make less money are not allowed to be made. Yet they are the only business that can make the products that are within their domain.

Applying the theory, it means if the need for the missing products gets intense enough, its price will go up high enough so that the corporation will switch over to providing that product instead of the other product that previously had been making the most money.

Does this work?

How long can a department store function when the clerks can set the price for whatever is brought to be bought at their counter? The clerks would be making great business, but nobody is minding the store.

In that anarchy of clerks, there are none who prepare for re-stocking nor for making sure the full range of goods and services is available to all customers. No one calculates the whole cost of providing things; in fact, few could do that and fewer care; and they are too busy anyway. Each anarchist business says that it is not their business to consider anything of the big picture; if some resource becomes depleted by their exorbitant use of it, then they will just open up some business that still has resources left in the big picture. Are they their brother's keeper?

Nature has provided a stern lesson for those who would carelessly eat themselves and their neighbors out of house and home; lesson even for those who are omnivores.