Trash-collecting entrepreneur squashed in San Francisco ↵

A guy named Joe got fed up of being charged $37/week for garbage disposal. So he decided to take things into his own hands. Eventually it turned into a small but profitable business. He worked from 5am to 8am everyday, and hired a few neighbourhood kids to help out.

All was going well for Little Joe until the Big Guys found out:

When the local garbage company and its union found out about "Joe" they complained to the city. Within a year a law was passed stating that garbage service was now mandatory for all residents at the price the city's monopoly charged, which was shortly raised. And Joe? For a while he still took our recyclables until he was fined $4000, even though he had our permission. It appears our household recyclables are owned by the Garbage company, not us, as it subsidizes our low cost of garbage service!

It is clear that monopolies are bad in business or unions and monopoly unions exist to enrich a class of privileged workers at the expense of ordinary workers.

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