You make a good point. I did a survey of national and local monopolies a while back, and I couldn't find many sustained ones (in the US) that weren't sponsored

You make a good point. I did a survey of national and local monopolies a while back, and I couldn't find many sustained ones (in the US) that weren't sponsored by the state. Oligopoly is another matter entirely. > Also don't forget that capitalism works until it doesn't, at which point a revolution may take place, and then anything can happen. Revolution may occur when the peasants feel injustice hard enough (the starvation poverty kind - not the poorer than Bill Gates kind) - but are there any examples of this happening in a more-or-less Laissez-faire market system? [I seriously don't know - could well have been]. Do you think that (for example, in the US) that we have enough mass of discontent to build up revolutionary momentum, given that the poor are (on average) fat, dumb and happy? For example, the driving force behind the French Revolution wasn't simply that people wanted social justice (although they wanted that too), but that they were hungry. And, in Venezuela, where there may be revolution soon (or simply escape), it isn't driven by a paradise of low-priced veggie options at every supermarket supplied by capitalism - it's desperation driven by hunger caused by extreme corruption that have gutted the country in the name of equality. For myself (and I realize that opinions vary), if the government keeps a light hand on making sure that people don't lie, cheat and steal as people engage in day-to-day commerce in the marketplace (as humans are wont to do - we like to trade, it seems), that generates "plenty" -- which we have seen from the kingdom of Lydia to the present day.