> - most of the industry is decentralized small contractors. You can't go viral with construction, you can't build monopolies to extract rents later on.
At least around my area (in the PNW somewhere), and specifically for residential construction, the opposite happens. The builder has a bunch of small contractors he uses -- but they are only legally separate. And disposable, to be crude. They arrangement is a monopsony -- the plumber only has one customer: the builder. Same for the electricians, framers, etc. Even though they're not employed by the builder, they might as well be. Hell, even the realtor who sells their houses is an independent contractor with only a single customer. Guarantee she isn't making 2.5% per sale.
Interesting. The builders I've worked with used lots of contractors like that, but most were worked with more than one builder. Now the contractors did assign crews to builders, and so the same people only worked on houses for that one builder, but the other teams worked for other builders.
At least around my area (in the PNW somewhere), and specifically for residential construction, the opposite happens. The builder has a bunch of small contractors he uses -- but they are only legally separate. And disposable, to be crude. They arrangement is a monopsony -- the plumber only has one customer: the builder. Same for the electricians, framers, etc. Even though they're not employed by the builder, they might as well be. Hell, even the realtor who sells their houses is an independent contractor with only a single customer. Guarantee she isn't making 2.5% per sale.