Yet the tech elite today, as well as their Wall Street allies, no longer resemble the entrepreneurs of the past. The masters of our increasingly “woke” corporate elites are, for the most part, now second-generation bureaucrats presiding over the wealthiest, most pervasive monopolies on the plant. Controlling 90 percent of a market like search (Google), operating system software (Microsoft), dominating the cloud and on-line retail (Amazon) or 90 percent of phones (Google and Apple) does not turn executives into-risk takers but acquirers. Three tech firms now account as well for two-thirds of all on-line advertising revenues, which now represent the vast majority of all ad sales. Once paragons of entrepreneurial vigor, these firms, as Mike Lind has noted, have morphed into exemplars of “tollbooth capitalism,” which receive revenues on transactions that far exceed anything they lose in failed ventures and acquisitions.
Finance, the other pillar, has also become markedly more concentrated, with the number of banks down a full third since 2000 in the U.S. while Europe experienced a slower, but similar consolidation. The five largest banks control more than 45 percent of all assets in the U.S., up from under 30 percent twenty years ago. The five largest investment banks control roughly one third of investment funds: the top 10 control an absolute majority.
This growing concentration fosters a greater acceptance and even eagerness for state regulation. In the earlier open, entrepreneurial period, tech and even finance executives tended to a variety of views, with most leaning towards libertarianism. Historically, Silicon Valley elected middle-of-the-road Republicans—liberal on defense and culture but fiscally conservative—like Pete McCloskey, Ed Zschau, and Tom Campbell. Democrats certainly were present and competitive, but those too tended towards the center.