Big Tech is Like the Cocaine Cartels

Wainwright’s Narconomics is one of my favorite books. In order to show how the free market really works, he went and studied it in its pure, unconstrained form: the cocaine cartels. It was a fun and insightful read, and ever since I first encountered it I’ve wanted him to go back and do a similar book about big tech companies. After all, they too sell artificially addictive products, treat the legal system as a mere expense, and are run by sociopathic narcissists. Wainwright’s thesis is that every business faces a common set of problems: how to maintain product quality, how to protect market territory, how to enforce agreements with suppliers, how to recruit and manage staff, and how to handle disputes with competitors. Legal businesses deal with these issues through a combination of contract law, trademark and patent protection, employment law, and (if all else fails) litigation. Drug cartels solve the same problems by different means, and their solutions reveal some interesting…