The Dollar-Store mergers are textbook cases of what's wrong with US economics

Quartz - The Family Dollar deals embodies everything wrong with American capitalism

Dollar Stores are the low-end competition to discount retailers like Walmart. (In my opinion, it's debatable whether these stores, which undercut price on a big box retailer that became successful by undercutting price on local Main St retailers, themselves represent problems in US economics.) Due to a combination of poor management at Family Dollar and also margin compression (read: the poor can't even afford to shop at Dollar Stores anymore) in that retail segment, billionaire investors have been pushing for a merger. Typically, these mergers cut expenses (read: layoff workers) with "synergies" between the two companies, making one larger company with more market share and therefore more price control (read: higher prices). While all the details of the deal aren't entirely disclosed in the article, it appears that the new company will be saddled with the debt used to make it. The owners (and mediocre CEO) will get healthy sale prices for their stock, exquisite profit for combining two companies that are struggling because the poorest of the US are struggling. This is considered a textbook confirmation of Thomas Piketty's observations in his book, Capital in the 21st Century.