r on any given market and so he did. Rockefeller would lower prices in a certain area selectively to choke any competitors out of the business.As part of his integration of other companies into his own, he would either attempt to purchase these companies at forty percent of their value as capital or eventually gave in to extreme pressures. There was no choice for most of the companies at the time; it was either sell or go out of business (micheloud). Eventually his rein began to end with The Sherman Antitrust Act in 1890. “The law forbids every contract, scheme, deal, and conspiracy to restrain trade (micheloud).” It also forbids conspirations to secure a monopoly of a given industry. Eleven years later the Supreme Court found that Standard Oil was in violation of The Sherman Antitrust Act. Standard oil was forced to dissolve into thirty-four separate companies (micheloud). One reason for disliking Monopolies like Standard oil is because they are allocatively inefficient. This means that the monopoly is preventing resources from being placed in the most proficient manner. This is depicted in figure 1 (Slavin). Another reason that most people do not like monopolies like Rockefeller’s is because they produce less than what the consumers want. Thus by restricting the supply, the monopolist has raised the price. This is seen in figure 2(Slavin).People hate monopolies for good reasons. They are too powerful in all aspects of their being. John D. Rockefeller was an extremely powerful monopolist. He trampled over all of his competition until the separation of Standard oil. Thus, the dissolving of his company was a great achievement for America. Now, no one will ever have to deal with a monopolist’s vicious overpowering of smaller companies. ...
