Some other giant concerns with headquarters in Great Britain are the following :–

Lloyds Bank Ltd. (capital £73,000,000).

Dunlop Rubber Co. Ltd. (capital £12,773,000).

Prudential Assurance Co. Ltd. (capital £2,250,000 ; assets £240 million).

Lever Bros. & Unilever Ltd. (capital £69,597,000, owns interests in over 300 associated companies operating all over the world).

Shell Transport & Trading Co. Ltd. (£41 million).

Cable & Wireless Ltd. (£30 million, owns practically all telegraphic, cable and wireless systems of British Empire).

London, Midland & Scottish Railway (£305 million).

It should be noted that the above figures of capital relate to the total of capital issued. Many of the stocks and shares are priced at far above their nominal value (as a consequence of high rates of profit being earned by the companies) and the total assets of the companies are often very much more than the figures of issued capital.

According to Mr. H. Leak, chief statistician of the Board of Trade, “though there were in 1935 some 257,000 firms (including local authorities) active in industry, British industry as a whole was dominated by no more than 2,000 separate large undertakings and the 1,000 largest businesses were responsible for half of all industrial output”. (The Times, 21 February, 1945) ; and as The Times points out, much further amalgamation has taken place since 1935.

Although there are and doubtless will continue to be large numbers of small and medium-size concerns, industry, commerce, transport and banking are more and more coming under the domination of huge amalgamated undertakings, or of national and international cartels and associations set up for the purpose of eliminating competition, fixing prices, or dividing up the market so that rival firms do not compete in the same region.

Up to the middle of the 19^th century and for many years afterwards the prevailing attitude of capitalists and of capitalistic politicians was one of opposing the encroachments of monopolistic concerns of all kinds. Thus when Disaeli’s Tory Cabinet had decided in 1868 that the Government should take over existing telegraph systems from the companies they did not at first propose to give the State telegraphs a monopoly, “but by 1869 opinions had changed and it was thought prudent to obtain protection against the establishment of new companies,” and a new Act in 1869 established the desired monopoly, (The Post Office, Sir Evelyn Murray, p.2.)

The general line of development has been that in periods of fairly widespread trade expansion and capitalist prosperity competition is not very keen – there is room for all and all are expanding. In such a period the Government (which is in a position either to encourage or to prohibit combines) has little occasion to interfere and the capitalists, not being faced with ruinous competition, do not strongly favour it. The great body of capitalists at such a time would be against the establishment of a monopoly in any field that might prove detrimental to their general interest, and if for any reason such a monopoly is established (e.g., the postal, telegraph and telephone monopoly) they would use every effort to see that its charges were strictly controlled.