How do we fight, is non-compliance enough?

Freedom from financial coercion

Financial freedom, being necessary for the wellbeing of free people, shall not be infringed by the government. The government shall not pass any laws that imposes financial befits to a particular sector of a population or entity at the expense of another. The government shall not impose laws that disincentivizes success of citizens. The government shall not issue fiat currency, all currency must be backed by tangible assists.

I’m not a lawyer but this is where I’d start. Simple is best, this would reinstate the gold standard or another assets, issue currency based on public land for god sakes, we already own it. Force a flat tax, everyone pays the same percentage based on total income. An amendment like this would secure our country for the foreseeable future, our biggest problem is financial coercion.

1) Yes, I understand that…. 20 trillion is a lot of money, $22.32 trillion is the size of the US economy in 2020. My point is that we need to investigate this to determine if they have been granted unfair privileges that enabled them to amass this volume of assets.

2) This kind of money has too much power over the free world. I smell something nefarious, it’s like rotted eggs and onions…

We have two options in the USA. First is to grow our own food and pay more for it in terms of money and labor, and the second is to get the food cheaper through these huge companies, but do their bidding.

If we are willing to pay more for food, we could patronize the small farmer again, which I think would be a better idea than giving these huge companies control over us. We can buy eggs from walmart cheap, or go to a small farmer and pay 3x as much but get a better product and no corporate control.

Do you want to know how mutual funds vote their proxies? Mutual funds and other registered management investment companies are required to disclose each year how they vote proxies relating to portfolio securities they hold. Not later than August 31st of each year, a mutual fund must file with the SEC a report known as Form N-PX, containing the fund’s complete proxy voting record for the most recent 12-month period ended June 30th. Funds were required to file their first Form N-PX not later than August 31, 2004.

Where can I find proxy voting record information?
A mutual fund’s proxy voting record is available from the fund and on the SEC’s website. A mutual fund must make the information disclosed in its most recently filed Form N-PX available to shareholders either on the fund’s website or upon request by calling a specified toll-free (or collect) telephone number. Many mutual funds make this information available on their websites. If a mutual fund makes its proxy voting record available to shareholders upon request, the fund must send the information to shareholders, without charge, within three business days of receipt of a request. You can find out how a mutual fund provides its proxy voting record to shareholders by reading its annual or semi-annual report to shareholders, or its statement of additional information, which is part of its registration statement.

Because a fund’s Form N-PX filing with the SEC is publicly available, you can find proxy voting record information for a mutual fund by searching the SEC’s EDGAR database. You can also find a mutual fund’s semi-annual and annual reports to shareholders, registration statement, and other SEC filings by searching the database.

What information must be disclosed?
A mutual fund must disclose the following information on Form N-PX for each matter relating to a portfolio security considered at a shareholder meeting and on which the fund is entitled to vote:

the name of the issuer of the portfolio security;
the exchange ticker symbol of the portfolio security;
the Committee on Uniform Security Identification Procedures (“CUSIP”) number for the portfolio security;
the shareholder meeting date;
a brief identification of the matter voted on;
whether the matter was proposed by the issuer or a security holder;
whether the fund cast its vote on the matter;
how the fund cast its vote (for example, for or against the proposal, or abstain; for or withhold regarding election of directors); and
whether the fund cast its vote for or against management.

Your other responses are a great education on the history and precedent of legal action on monopolist practices. However, shareholders are not held responsible for the decisions of corporate management, so that argument falls flat if the decisions of the corporate managers are the cause of what are determined to be monopolist or trust activities. I have no doubt that the miscreants will try to make this argument, but if their actions are deemed the cause of excessive cost increases or restricted product availability they will be found at fault.

Another point: even if the few investment firms have ownership of most of the market, control does not automatically lead to abuse. As you cite in the excellent dissertation above, the measure of trust or monopolist activity requires evidence of abuse of market power, not just the percentage of the market controlled.

In determining whether a competitor possesses monopoly power in a relevant market, courts typically begin by looking at the firm's market share.(18) Although the courts "have not yet identified a precise level at which monopoly power will be inferred,"(19) they have demanded a dominant market share. Discussions of the requisite market share for monopoly power commonly begin with Judge Hand's statement in United States v. Aluminum Co. of America that a market share of ninety percent "is enough to constitute a monopoly; it is doubtful whether sixty or sixty-four percent would be enough; and certainly thirty-three per cent is not."(20) The Supreme Court quickly endorsed Judge Hand's approach in American Tobacco Co. v. United States.(21)

Following Alcoa and American Tobacco, courts typically have required a dominant market share before inferring the existence of monopoly power. The Fifth Circuit observed that "monopolization is rarely found when the defendant's share of the relevant market is below 70%."(22) Similarly, the Tenth Circuit noted that to establish "monopoly power, lower courts generally require a minimum market share of between 70% and 80%."(23) Likewise, the Third Circuit stated that "a share significantly larger than 55% has been required to establish prima facie market power"(24) and held that a market share between seventy-five percent and eighty percent of sales is "more than adequate to establish a prima facie case of power."(25)

It is also important to consider the share levels that have been held insufficient to allow courts to conclude that a defendant possesses monopoly power. The Eleventh Circuit held that a "market share at or less than 50% is inadequate as a matter of law to constitute monopoly power."(26) The Seventh Circuit observed that "[f]ifty percent is below any accepted benchmark for inferring monopoly power from market share."(27) A treatise agrees, contending that "it would be rare indeed to find that a firm with half of a market could individually control price over any significant period."(28)

Some courts have stated that it is possible for a defendant to possess monopoly power with a market share of less than fifty percent.(29) These courts provide for the possibility of establishing monopoly power through non-market-share evidence, such as direct evidence of an ability profitably to raise price or exclude competitors. The Department is not aware, however, of any court that has found that a defendant possessed monopoly power when its market share was less than fifty percent.(30) Thus, as a practical matter, a market share of greater than fifty percent has been necessary for courts to find the existence of monopoly power.(31)

They are asset managers.... the money to a large degree is mutual fund or hedge fund investors pensions ,endowments , 401ks and other Qualified plans.

Market power is a seller's ability to exercise some control over the price it charges. In our economy, few firms are pure price takers facing perfectly elastic demand.(6) For example, the unique location of a dry cleaner may confer slight market power because some customers are willing to pay a little more rather than walk an extra block or two to the next-closest dry cleaner. Economists say the dry cleaner possesses market power, if only to a trivial degree. Virtually all products that are differentiated from one another, if only because of consumer tastes, seller reputation, or producer location, convey upon their sellers at least some degree of market power. Thus, a small degree of market power is very common and understood not to warrant antitrust intervention.(7)

Market power and monopoly power are related but not the same. The Supreme Court has defined market power as "the ability to raise prices above those that would be charged in a competitive market,"(8) and monopoly power as "the power to control prices or exclude competition."(9) The Supreme Court has held that "[m]onopoly power under § 2 requires, of course, something greater than market power under § 1."(10) Precisely where market power becomes so great as to constitute what the law deems to be monopoly power is largely a matter of degree rather than one of kind. Clearly, however, monopoly power requires, at a minimum, a substantial degree of market power.(11) Moreover, before subjecting a firm to possible challenge under antitrust law for monopolization or attempted monopolization, the power in question is generally required to be much more than merely fleeting; that is, it must also be durable.(12)

Although monopoly power will generally result in the setting of prices above competitive levels, the desire to obtain profits that derive from a monopoly position provides a critical incentive for firms to invest and create the valuable products and processes that drive economic growth.(13) For this reason, antitrust law does not regard as illegal the mere possession of monopoly power where it is the product of superior skill, foresight, or industry.(14) Where monopoly power is acquired or maintained through anticompetitive conduct, however, antitrust law properly objects.

Section 2's requirement that single-firm conduct create or maintain, or present a dangerous probability of creating, monopoly power serves as an important screen for evaluating single-firm liability. Permitting conduct that likely creates at most an ability to exercise a minor degree of market power significantly reduces the possibility of discouraging "the competitive enthusiasm that the antitrust laws seek to promote"(15) and assures the majority of competitors that their unilateral actions will not violate section 2. It also reduces enforcement costs, including costs associated with devising and policing remedies. The costs that firms, courts, and competition authorities would incur in identifying and litigating liability, as well as devising and policing remedies for any and all conduct with the potential to have a minor negative impact on competition for short periods, would almost certainly far outweigh the benefits, particularly if the calculus includes, as it should, the loss of procompetitive activity that would inevitably be discouraged in such a system.

The problem is the ownership is not BlackRock or Vanguard or Carlisle or American funds. They are the asset managers the owners are people who have 401k’s ,IRA’s and other Qualified retirement acts. As the centralized source of those proxy votes they the managers have the power. Monopoly laws do not have any teeth against this power position.

Yes, but in the beginning it was tiny like a mouse, ever present in may photos, cartoons, comics and drawings...then it was exposed to radiation and grew into the Nephlim Rat Fink we know today.

Just messing around with the art me dino posted above, I believe I found the original Roth Rat Fink.
https://www.bing.com/images/search?vi...

Hopefully the Best of US and NOT the Worst of Them...

if the worse happens
we MUST make sure those responsible are held to account

Thanks for the "memeories!" That first one was a 59 Ford Galaxy...

Boom! Nailed it, dino! LOL

Thanks for giving me dino a long forgotten name to work with~~https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=...

Big Daddy Roth stuff? I remember that!

The world is quickly being forced to a turning point the likes of which we have never seen. I wonder who makes it out on the other side.

Me dino suddenly recalls T-Shirts with cartoon monsters on crazy looking hot rods with a hand or claws on long gear-shifting sticks.
I was close to fully grown at the time.

Interesting inside attack plan there, N.

First we have to address the fact that these creatures do not follow the law as dictated by the constitution but your amendment is spot on...write it up and we'll all sign it!

At least ole larry fink isn't sticking out of a 25 model T roof, drooling and shifting...

Thanks for your input Doc, The monopoly laws didn't occur to me right off...that's the way to do it!

When I watched it, I often heard my mother in the kitchen singing along with the theme song.
She hardly watched the show but loved that song.