The Big Fix

In their 2024 book The Big Fix, Denise Hearn and Vass Bednar deliver a wake-up call about the state of competition in Canada. At roughly 140 pages, it's a quick and engaging read aimed at general audiences frustrated with high prices.

The core argument is straightforward: a handful of large companies increasingly dominate key sectors through mergers, "rollup" acquisitions (quietly buying up smaller competitors below regulatory radar), cross-subsidies, and what the authors call "kayfabe" competition — the illusion of rivalry that masks real market power. This concentration, they argue, leads to higher consumer prices, lower wages, reduced innovation, fewer startups, and slower economic growth.

Canada's competition laws, largely unchanged since the 1980s and overly focused on "efficiency" rather than power, have failed to check this trend. The authors call for a "whole of government" approach: stronger antitrust tools, structural remedies (like limiting vertical integration), blocking more mergers, and shifting focus from pure price effects to broader questions of corporate power over data, labour, and suppliers. I'm sympathetic to this point of view, and even support the principles behind such an approach, but what I fear is the government bloat that often arises from such initiatives. Regulatory capture combined with a more powerful government could end up stifling the very competition that would help alleviate the monopolies the authors despise.

So while the authors place the primary blame on private corporate power and weak enforcement, they give no mind to government-created barriers that also stifle competition. Notably absent is any discussion of supply management in dairy, poultry, and eggs, a government-sanctioned cartel that uses quotas and tariffs to limit supply and keep prices artificially high for Canadian consumers. Similarly, the book does not substantially tackle how excessive regulations and occupational licensing create barriers to entry: for example, the old taxi medallion systems that long protected incumbents from Uber-style disruption, or the heavy certification requirements (sometimes 1,000+ hours of training) for trades like hairstyling that raise costs and limit new entrepreneurs, or foreign ownership rules that protect certain industries (airlines, telecom etc) from competition.

In my own industry, I've faced massive regulatory barriers that have kept my business from being much larger than it currently is. These omissions matter. A fuller picture of Canada's competition challenges should include both private monopolistic behavior and public policy choices that protect incumbents by raising artificial hurdles for newcomers.

Overall, The Big Fix is worth reading if you want a clear overview of how corporate concentration harms everyday Canadians and what bolder antitrust reforms could look like. But it felt heavily partisan because of what it left out: a conversation about government-imposed barriers as well.