Hostile Takeover?

There is no doubt that the influence of global corporations has grown vastly since the end of the Second World War. This is due to many factors, but perhaps most important is the unstoppable trend towards immense size.

This, in turn, is driven by the desire to take competitors off the field, and achieve dominance in particular markets, or cluster of markets. From the corporate viewpoint, bigger is always better, as real competition just reduces profits.

There are legitimate economies of scale that result from scaling up production facilities. But just as important is the increased leverage that results from sheer size, to squeeze both suppliers and customers in the drive to reduce costs.
Corporations and Fortune 500, 2010s map

  Profit Extraction Centers
The map above shows the location of Fortune 500 corporations in America in 2010. The size of the green circles is proportional to annual revenue. Giant firms are concentrated in a dozen or so major cities (inside ORANGE ovals). Most are on the East Coast, but the largest individual players are located in the middle of the country, and on the tech-heavy Pacific Coast.

Global Fortune 100, 2010 map

  Global Competition
The circles on the map above indicate profits (not revenue) of the world's 100 largest corporate giants in 2010, which again are clustered in just a few cities. It reveals that, although American GDP is roughly equal to that of China (and to that of Europe taken as a whole), America's share of yearly corporate profits nearly equals that of the entire rest of the world, combined. While America has lost most of its industrial capacity, it excels at controlling the flow of wealth.


Offshoring, shrinking industry, 2010 map

  Offshoring
This map indicates that there are still plenty of things being made in America, despite the 'offshoring' of most heavy industry to Asian countries, where labor costs are much lower. Manufacturing sites that remain have mostly moved out of the city, and into suburban industrial parks, where land is less expensive. RED patches on the map indicate urban areas that lost manufacturing jobs during the preceding decade, in a process likely to continue.