- cross-posted to:
- canada@lemmy.ca
- canada@lemmy.ca
Canada’s grocery business is controlled by large players and needs government assistance to encourage new entrants to bring down prices, a report from Canada’s Competition Bureau says.
juusukun ( @juusukun@lemmy.ca ) 36•1 year agoIn other news, water is wet!
We used to have laws and regulations in place for stuff like this, same with the USA. As years passed they lost their teeth
Thalestr ( @Thalestr@beehaw.org ) 18•1 year agoCanada’s regulatory agencies feel so incredibly spineless. So many industries here are unchecked oligopolies with skyrocketing prices.
My American friends are jawdropped when I tell them how much food, internet, and cell plans cost here.
Cyborganism ( @cyborganism@lemmy.ca ) 7•1 year agoThe people in charge… They’re all bought and paid for. That’s why.
likelytrash ( @likelytrash@lemmy.ca ) 5•1 year agoRegulatory capture is a common theme regardless of industry here
Cyborganism ( @cyborganism@lemmy.ca ) 2•1 year agoRight???
Thalestr ( @Thalestr@beehaw.org ) 1•1 year agoExactly.
Tigbitties ( @Tigbitties@kbin.social ) 17•1 year agoYou don’t get to have teeth when you’re sucking at the teets.
Erk ( @Erk@cdda.social ) 7•1 year agoThis was very snappily phrased and made me snort my drink, well done my friend.
IninewCrow ( @ininewcrow@lemmy.ca ) 5•1 year agoYou lose all your teeth if all you’re eating is cookies, candy and Coca Cola everyday. Our economy is basically a toothless overweight diabetic
likelytrash ( @likelytrash@lemmy.ca ) 5•1 year agoExcept it’s not even as diverse as cookies, candy and cola. It’s just real estate all the way down.
they lost their teeth
A lot of root canals championed by neo-liberalism.
CoffeeBot ( @CoffeeBot@lemmy.ca ) English31•1 year agoThe Weston’s own most of the pharmacy, the grocery, food supply chain, and are moving into healthcare at breakneck pace. No shit it’s too concentrated. We need actual antitrust laws.
enragedchowder ( @enragedchowder@lemmy.ca ) English17•1 year agoSadly it doesn’t matter if we have antitrust laws or not when no one is willing to enforce them.
Storksforlegs ( @storksforlegs@beehaw.org ) English6•1 year agoIt does matter, we just need to put more public pressure on them.
Erk ( @Erk@cdda.social ) English8•1 year agoI hope “public pressure” is euphemistic for things a little more, erm, firm than “write angry articles on cbc”
OminousOrange ( @OminousOrange@lemmy.ca ) English6•1 year agoThere was so much pressure on the Shawgers buyout, the Competition Bureau was overwhelmed. Yet, here we are.
SheerDumbLuck ( @SheerDumbLuck@lemmy.ca ) English4•1 year agoThey also own real estate under Choice Properties.
Rob Bos ( @rbos@lemmy.ca ) 31•1 year agoMuch cheaper to break up the monopolies and change the system to prevent them forming in the first place. Subsidizing new entrants without changing the environment that creates monopolies will just feed the beasts with fresh meat.
Rising5315 ( @Rising5315@kbin.social ) 14•1 year agoBreak up the Weston vertical monopoly and watch how fast the rest starts evening out.
yaygya ( @yaygya@fedia.io ) 13•1 year agoBasically what happened in the mobile space. I’m 2008 CRTC had an AWS spectrum auction for new entrants in the wireless industry, namely Mobilicity, Public Mobile, and WIND Mobile. Public was bought out by Telus. Mobilicity was bought by Rogers and merged with Chatr. WIND hung out longer and became Freedom under Shaw, but of course Shawgers happened, so we’re back to square one.
Jamil ( @Jamil@lemmy.ca ) 5•1 year agoDon’t forget that these telecom companies are also media companies, owning channels like CityTV, Global, CTV, Corus. They also control the news grandma and grandpa see on the 6pm news.
lightrush ( @lightrush@lemmy.ca ) 5•1 year agoFreedom is under Quebecor now. Not great not terrible. Quebecor is much smaller outside of QC so they keep competing for now.
- argv_minus_one ( @argv_minus_one@beehaw.org ) 1•1 year ago
US telecoms went through something similar with the breakup of the Bell company. Many of the resulting “Baby Bells” reassembled themselves like the T-1000 into a handful of colossal telecom companies, and most of those companies don’t compete in each other’s territories, forming regional monopolies. All kinds of illegal, of course, but the government has yet to take any further action.
Cyborganism ( @cyborganism@lemmy.ca ) 3•1 year agoExactly. The big corps will just buy the new players and everything will go back to the way it was.
This government has no vision.
SpaceCowboy ( @SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca ) 23•1 year ago“Yeah, no shit” every Canadian says.
KingPyrox ( @KingPyrox@lemmy.ca ) 21•1 year ago5 companies for food is not enough competition but somehow 3 telecom providers is 🤔
RandAlThor ( @RandAlThor@lemmy.ca ) 16•1 year agoNo crap! Duhhh. Finally competition bureau is doing some of their home work. And new entrant encouragement isn’t the only action that’s available. And that’s not the only sector that’s been consolidated either. Someone needs to kick the behind of these bureaucrats.
AssaultPepper ( @AssaultPepper@kbin.social ) 3•1 year agoAre there any trackers on what they or the CRTC have done? It’d be nice to hold them accountable for not just saying things but actually doing things.
LostWon ( @LostWon@lemmy.ca ) 2•1 year agoI tried to see if Open Media has something, but looks like it’s just the campaigns: https://openmedia.org/campaigns
There was a campaign a year ago about telecom monopoly practices, but it’s now closed: https://openmedia.org/press/item/over-28000-petition-signers-call-for-end-to-canadas-telecom-monopoly
iAmTheTot ( @iAmTheTot@kbin.social ) 10•1 year agoWe just let Roger’s buy Shaw, I doubt anything will change.
AlternateRoute ( @AlternateRoute@lemmy.ca ) 8•1 year agoDon’t see how this will work? Walmart entered Canada many years ago and does groceries yet pricing all settled out. If Walmart isn’t driving competition and pricing down what will?
LostWon ( @LostWon@lemmy.ca ) 9•1 year agoI’ve seen a couple of (very limited) examples of restaurants using their contracts with suppliers to open small local grocery stores near their restaurants, that undercut the big grocery chains. If anything was possible, I’d prefer more local neighbourhood stores for packaged foods and community garden co-ops combined with farmer’s markets for fresh foods.
oneofthemladygoats ( @oneofthemladygoats@lemmy.ca ) 3•1 year agoThe Lufa model needs to spread across the country
Storksforlegs ( @storksforlegs@beehaw.org ) 5•1 year agoI dont know, more competitors would still be better.
Ive seen my local no frills lower prices to match Walmart sales.
gifferqqq ( @gifferqqq@kbin.social ) 4•1 year agoThere aren’t that many Wallmarts relative to grocery stores and they also aren’t usually in the same areas that people do grocery shopping, so I don’t think they are a significant competition.
zephyreks ( @zephyreks@lemmy.ca ) 5•1 year agoNo way! People should go shop at ethnic grocers, if only to break up the monopoly.
tendou ( @tendou@lemmy.ca ) 4•1 year agoSo many small store are close becuase don’t want to take the covid fund because language barrer, store rent are go to sky because the building owner think the store can earn 70% like 17 years ago. The item get from the distubutor is already x3 the price sold on big store and the customer complain is too expensive, look at those big store, they are only $ and you sell $$.
tendou ( @tendou@lemmy.ca ) 2•1 year agooh! And sometime the item is distrubute by those big store, because sometime they will telephone the store, do you want to sell fruit… so nothing can do at the small store part.