31–40 of 53 posts
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If this was the case they could simply have left it up to the market to decide the balance of efficiency and life. If your supposition was correct then the hypothetical "5W deep orange" bulb would not have sold.
Assuming that the collusion actually took place, which I don't put my bets in. I remember seeing 'long life lamps' on supermarket when bulbs were a thing, BTW.
This is what results from truly free markets.
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Competition killed the cartel... not government.
> The cartel ceased operations in 1939 owing to the outbreak of World War II. World War II was a kind of competition, I guess.
WW2 might have been the deathknell but it was already well on its way to its own demise.
Cartels only really work when you have governments to enforce them (see: wireless and ISP pricing in Canada)... these voluntary cartels very rarely work for a long period of time in a 'free market'. At most they'll get a few years before the public and competitors realize it.
This entire scheme was predicated on the benefit of the lack of awareness by the public/markets. In the 1920s you could rely on a lack of free flow of information (or at most a severely inefficient flow of information), such as pricing awareness in different markets:
> The cartel operated without the knowledge of the public
The internet would have killed this type of thing way faster. But given it was the 1920s and an international operation in a pre-global marketplace it took some time for competition to react. Plus many of the 'controlled' markets were colonial countries where information/markets could be far easier to control than an actual free market with a free press.
Reading up on it, it seems like the justification for creating Phoebus was to standardize the industry (it's the reason all of our lightbulbs today follow the same rating system and screw in the same way). But clearly they ran amok to serve their own interests. Cartels are very interesting: historically few are successful long term - there is too much incentive for newcomers to undercut prices. They need something to…
Lightbulbs aren't all that standardized though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightbulb_socket I had never seen a bayonet mount before I moved to Australia, but they're still reasonably common here.
I need to replace a lightbulb in my hallway, but I don't know if it's screw of bayonet. I always forget to check at home, and then when I'm at the shops I don't know what one to get. It's been like that for a month now.
" worked to standardize the life expectancy of light bulbs at 1,000 hours (down from 2,500 hours), and raised prices without fear of competition. The cartel tested their bulbs and fined manufacturers for bulbs that lasted more than 1,000 hours.".. Wow. How is this legal?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The cartel ceased operations in 1939 owing to the outbreak of World War II. World War II was a kind of competition, I guess.
> In the late 1920s, a Swedish-Danish-Norwegian union of companies (the North European Luma Co-op Society) planned an independent manufacturing center. Economic and legal threats by Phoebus did not achieve the desired effect, and in 1931 the Scandinavians produced and sold lamps at a considerably lower price than Phoebus. WW2 might have been the deathknell but it was already well on its way to its own demise. Cartels…
The Phoebus Cartel worked for fifteen years. That's plenty of time to prove that "free" markets just don't work.
> Cartels only really work when you have governments to enforce them (see: wireless and ISP pricing in Canada)
I don't know about the specifics of the situtation in Canada, but networks are natural monopolies. Competition does not make sense in that sphere to begin with.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Lightbulbs aren't all that standardized though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightbulb_socket I had never seen a bayonet mount before I moved to Australia, but they're still reasonably common here.
Bayonet mounts are common for car turn signals, or at least they were in the 1980s and 1990s.
=(. Sad.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Lightbulbs aren't all that standardized though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightbulb_socket I had never seen a bayonet mount before I moved to Australia, but they're still reasonably common here.
The split between bayonet and screw in Australia does my head in, especially if you're in an older house where the landlord is cheap/doesn't care and half your sockets are bayonet and half are screw. I need to replace a lightbulb in my hallway, but I don't know if it's screw of bayonet. I always forget to check at home, and then when I'm at the shops I don't know what one to get. It's been like that for a month now.
One day I'll be pissed off enough at the problem to buy the solution but I suspect that'll take some time since the infrequency with which I replace bulbs means it doesn't sit in my active memory as something to do.