Page:Karl Kautsky - The Class Struggle (Erfurt Program) - tr. William Edward Bohn (1910).djvu/70

 in general, there is no capitalist but is anxious to see his own goods free from competition in the market. If he is the sole possessor of goods for which there is a demand, if he has a monopoly of them, he can send their priceesprices [sic] far above their actual value; then those who need his goods will be wholly dependent upon him. Where several sellers of the same goods appear in the market, they can establish a monopoly only by combining in such a way that they virtually become one seller. Such combines—rings, syndidicates, trusts—are the sooner and more easily brought about the smaller the number of competitors whose conflicting interests are to be harmonized.

In so far as the capitalist system expands the market and increases the number of competitors in it, it makes difficult the formation of monopolies in production and commerce. But in every branch of capitalist industry the moment arrives, sooner or later, when its further development implies the lessening of the number of establishments engaged in it. From that moment on the march is rapid toward the syndicate and the trust. The time when, in a given country, the syndicate can ripen into a trust may be hastened through the protection of its domestic market against foreign competitors by a high tariff. In such a case the number of competitors is diminished and the domestic producers can more easily come together, establish a monopoly, and, thanks to "Protection of home industry," fleece the national consumer to their hearts' content.

During the last twenty years the number of