>>826960The capitalist class does whatever is profitable. Encouraging full competition would have raped the profit rate and created constant crises in capitalism. The economy was already being raped by stagflation, which was due to declining profitability. Decreasing profitability even further by encouraging more competition would not have solved it. All of this of course, and it unfortunately needs to be said, is not a defence of neoliberalism, but a critique against the idea that the capitalist class is irrational or cruel, which is the runway to typical leftoid theses that the solution would have been "if only the capitalist class was smarter". The reality is there is was no domestic solution to profitability crises. And it was outsourcing that saved capitalism, not regulatory capture.