While I agree with you, I would point out that planned economy plans are rarely "for the good of everyone". Planmakers tend to enrich themselves and their buddies.
I'm tempted to write never, but there might have been that one historical event when it went right.
That's why I wrote "not even nominally for the good of everyone" - explicit economic plans, at least the socialist variety are usually for the good of all in theory but not in practice. A monopoly-based plan would not even claim to be.
Also, I don't think the biggest problem with plans is self-enrichment by the plan makers, but inflexibility, the lack of good information, misaligned incentives and unintended consequences. And the biggest strength of a market economy is not the absence of any of these problems, but that they don't effect everything euqally and the companies that are affected the most just fail without dragging down everything.
>While I agree with you, I would point out that planned economy plans are rarely "for the good of everyone".
This is exactly how it works under our system too. Instead of economic planning being set in motion by the nomenklatura, it's done by the heads of major banks.
Monopolies can only happen with a large and determined government to reinforce them. Actual monopolies are exceedingly rare, and nobody has ever provided me with an example where the monopoly power was not in part or wholly provided by the government. No monopoly can overcome the power of technological innovation and the desire for lower cost goods and services in even the medium term.
Monopolies and planned economies are two sides of the over-sized/too-powerful government coin.
I'm all for stopping monopolies from forming, but the solution to that is not anti-trust style laws, but a focus on preventing the conditions that allow monopolies to continue.
> Saying that only "many players can ensure progress continues" and thus prohibiting companies to merge is interfering with economic freedom in the name of "I know better"
Sounds like you're advocating that all mergers should be allowed, even if they produce monopolies, and that not having many players would be OK.
The notion that regulation which disallows two billion-dollar companies with thousands of employees to merge because they'd afterwards dominate an important market has anything to do with "the right for people to work together" is somewhere between fundamentalist and disingenuous.
If a company ends up being the only one providing a product or service on a market, there is nothing wrong with that, as long as other companies are not prohibited to enter the market if they are capable to. And I repeat : you have no right to prevent people from working together if they want to. It's none of your business.
If you're upset with a company dominating a market, just create your own company to compete with it.
Yes, there is a lot wrong with that, as there are often significant inherent barriers to enter a market, and lots of things an incumbent can do to hinder competition, not all of which can be made illegal.
And a good government has every right to prevent this situation, that is exactly its business.
I'm tempted to write never, but there might have been that one historical event when it went right.