[rland]

Well, yes, the concept is not new. What seems new to me is an increased focus on massive expansion in sectors that traditionally didn't operate that way.

Of course railroads, oil, and steel were the first groups who naturally thought, "wouldn't it be great if we were the only people doing this, and we didn't have to deal with other people competing?" Since those businesses are big by their nature (capital intensive, worldwide market, often working directly with national governments).

But now this attitude is everywhere. Dog walking, taxicabs, office space. Not to mention the traditional areas like insurance, healthcare, telecom, etc. It seems like everyone, across every sector, is trying to merge and congeal into a single blob that extracts a reliable stream of money each month. Those who aren't already around are trying to skip the "make a good/valuable business" part and skip straight to the money extraction step. And I think in many places, businesses are way more focused on this than on actually doing or providing valuable services/things for people.

I'm speaking in really broad terms here. The cultural focus seems to have shifted from "how can we make the best product" to "how can we guarantee payment every month by consolidating/merging."