Due to the government regulation, utilities are quite different. Their profit is a percentage of their approved costs. Being an average utility or the best run in the world does not change that. Nor do I see where the unhappy utility customers will go if they do not like their monopoly.
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By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was not part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good. It is an affectation, indeed, not very common among merchants, and very few words need be employed in dissuading them from it.
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Taking the rest of the comment as fact still does not support the last sentence.
If
1) Walmart is selling all the new & best sellers (i.e. a huge % of the volume) at prices B&M bookstores can't compete with thus removing most selling profit
and
2) Amazon continues to grow,
then I think B&M will continue to shrink. College towns and small communities with bike paths, Whole Foods and million dollar homes may have a B&M but where else?
Slashdot Mirror
Due to the government regulation, utilities are quite different. Their profit is a percentage of their approved costs. Being an average utility or the best run in the world does not change that. Nor do I see where the unhappy utility customers will go if they do not like their monopoly.
" By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was not part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good. It is an affectation, indeed, not very common among merchants, and very few words need be employed in dissuading them from it. "
Taking the rest of the comment as fact still does not support the last sentence. If 1) Walmart is selling all the new & best sellers (i.e. a huge % of the volume) at prices B&M bookstores can't compete with thus removing most selling profit and 2) Amazon continues to grow, then I think B&M will continue to shrink. College towns and small communities with bike paths, Whole Foods and million dollar homes may have a B&M but where else?