Yea, we seem to agree that people can't actually push the needle on these kinds of issues in a meaningful way through their individual choices as consumers. Tha

Yea, we seem to agree that people can't actually push the needle on these kinds of issues in a meaningful way through their individual choices as consumers. That's a dead end, and it's one industries that fear getting regulated have settled on pushing at every opportunity, exactly because it's a dead end Ultimately, the only thing powerful enough to take on a cartel is a government. A lot of people have negative feelings about the abstract concept of government, and certainly the government sucks sometimes. Nearly any way that an individual can come up against power has the potential to suck a lot However, democratic governments for all their failings are far more responsive than consolidated industries to pressure from people who want change. Our "brand of capitalism" - by which I mean the particular economic and regulatory policies of the US government at this moment in time - is doing significant harm to the majority of people, in a way that it just wasn't in my parents' generation, and it doesn't have to stay this way. The options are not accept how things are or tilt at windmills by doing a master's thesis worth of research for every item we buy at the grocery store. The political will for better safety nets, better research and regulation, economic policy that helps the majority of people instead of a tiny sliver of the most deep-pocketed, and siccing the government on the cartels that increasingly dominate every industry is pervasive. The bet cartels are making is that they can create apathy and confusion to forestall this until they can burn down the institution of democracy itself