I read an interesting claim in a book about economics recently: that Wall Street wasn't an industry, but a monopoly. The argument was that in a normal industry

I read an interesting claim in a book about economics recently: that Wall Street wasn't an industry, but a monopoly. The argument was that in a normal industry, companies in competition with each other benefit when a competitor goes out of business. Other firms step in and snap up the opportunities. But with Wall Street, the whole network of companies needs a government bail out to stop their wholesale collapse when one company gets into trouble (eg. Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers). Thus they are not really an industry of competing companies, but should be seen as a single monopolistic entity. (of course they are filled with competitive people, but think of how departments and employees within the same company compete with each other)