You don't think a company offering products for free has an effect on competition and the number of products you could choose from? There is a reason there are price floors.
I've never heard that the reason govt break up monopolies is only because of the negative effect on the consumer. It has a negative effect on everyone involved in the economy. Customers, competitors, partners, providors, etc.
Which is true, but that's where I turn the conversation back around to something JE said earlier in it. So? Competitors not being able to compete is a problem
they should have to solve, not you and I, nor the government.
The argument you're making has always been used to justify a problem to the consumer: higher prices due to less competition--an objectively bad result. If a monopoly isn't controlling prices to the detriment of the consumer, I don't see how it's bad for them to exist.
Let's use my favorite remaining retail store, Barnes and Noble, for example. Amazon is killing them and there's a real chance B&N may go out of business. Is that the DOJ's job to prevent, or is the problem that B&N isn't agile at all? I'd argue the latter. Here's an idea I had for B&N this past holiday season: stop selling vinyl records, record players, and DVDs, and instead capitalize on the disappearance of Toys R Us by expanding their toy selection. Instead, there is still physical media inventory on the shelves from the holidays left unsold.
Artificially keeping sinking companies afloat doesn't help anyone but those companies. Yes, all those B&N employees will lose their jobs if the stores close, but that may happen even if Amazon is broken up. Again, bad business decisions aren't the responsibility of oversight to clean up.
Just FTR, I believe Amazon is a monster that does use unfair tactics--especially against their supply chain. That needs to be looked at, and again, possibly regulated. But I don't see how separating Prime shipping and video from each other provides
anyone a benefit. If someone can realistically address how it would, I'll certainly entertain the idea. But it feels like the argument against the Big 4 is just a contrived "Well, they're big so they're bad, and if they're small everything will be better" and that just doesn't resonate with me.