# Buying-Up The Competition...

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-up-the-competition/126753>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [September 3, 2002, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-up-the-competition/126753 "2002-09-03T03:55:28Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Jinx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Jinx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jinx)\
**Post date:** [September 3, 2002, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-up-the-competition/126753/1 "2002-09-03T03:55:28Z")

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So, what’s the point of “free enterprise” if the most powerful one buys out all the others? Do consumers really get the bets price? Ultimately, who pays for “free enterprise”? - Jinx

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**Author:** ![Billdo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/billdo/32/315_2.png) [@Billdo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Billdo)\
**Post date:** [September 3, 2002, 11:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buying-up-the-competition/126753/2 "2002-09-03T11:22:09Z")

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In the US and EU, among other places, antitrust laws regulate mergers among competitors. Where the antitrust regulators determine that a particular merger will have an anti-competitive impact, they can prohibit it or impose conditions to lessen the impact on competition.