The Bugaboo of Trusts
References and Quotes
Reference
The End Of Competition
Though Morgan seems to have had a clear anti-competitive bent, I don't think Carnegie rolled that way. He was more old-school crush the competition beneath your feet and grind their bones to dust type of guy. He was notorious for entering anti-competitive pool agreements with other business and then breaking them when he felt like it and costing the other members huge sums. In his essay, The Bugaboo of Trusts he explains the logic of trusts and how in practice they are continually undermined when their temporarily increased profits attract new competition that they can't adequately respond to:
Quote
Used in: The End Of Competition
The people of America can smile at the efforts of all her railway magnates and of all her manufacturers to defeat the economic laws by Trusts or combinations, or pools, or "differentials," or anything of like character. Only let them hold firmly to the doctrine of free competition. Keep the field open. Freedom for all to engage in railroad building when and where capital desires, subject to conditions open to all. Freedom for all to engage in any branch of manufacturing under like conditions. (p. 21)