Reflections on the Conglomerate Movement; To Both Sol Yurick and Donald Light

Abstract

Now that some of the tremendous energy of the recent merger movement has been sapped, it should be possible to draw some conclusions about the conglomerate corporations which dominated the movement (as the editors pointed out in their Review of the Month of June 1969). You analyzed the movement in the context of the long-term trend toward concentration of capital, and called attention to the political co-efficients of the conglomerate movement. The old guard of Wall Street has pulled in the reins on some of the flashier conglomerators, but today the top corporations are substantially more diversified than before the movement began. The trend continues, and some important implications of it need to be specified with more precision.

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