GE owns Universal now. Which merged with Comcast/NBC.
Here's the thing.
Our economy is based on growth; not just profit, but continually larger profits. The stock market absolutely requires growth. After a certain point, the only way for a company to grow is to absorb its competitors. The inevitable result of that is acquisitions and mergers. Acquisitions and mergers lead to several large companies holding functional monopolies over the market. Furthermore, interlocking directorates mean that in many cases these corporate giants are collaborating with each other, not competing. Anti-trust laws used to limit how much control any one company had over the media... not anymore; thanks Telecommunications Act!
And they're not done merging, yet. No matter how big they get, they still have to keep growing, which explains a lot about our intensely militarized society and the reasons we have to keep going into other countries to "fight for democracy". At present, over 51% of the entire U.S. budget goes toward our military. And that military is fighting to "protect our interests", which really means to "gain access to resources and markets" for Big Corp. The U.S. government works for U.S. assets, not U.S. citizens.
Rah rah, go USA!
Here's the thing.
Our economy is based on growth; not just profit, but continually larger profits. The stock market absolutely requires growth. After a certain point, the only way for a company to grow is to absorb its competitors. The inevitable result of that is acquisitions and mergers. Acquisitions and mergers lead to several large companies holding functional monopolies over the market. Furthermore, interlocking directorates mean that in many cases these corporate giants are collaborating with each other, not competing. Anti-trust laws used to limit how much control any one company had over the media... not anymore; thanks Telecommunications Act!
And they're not done merging, yet. No matter how big they get, they still have to keep growing, which explains a lot about our intensely militarized society and the reasons we have to keep going into other countries to "fight for democracy". At present, over 51% of the entire U.S. budget goes toward our military. And that military is fighting to "protect our interests", which really means to "gain access to resources and markets" for Big Corp. The U.S. government works for U.S. assets, not U.S. citizens.
Rah rah, go USA!