No, really. Free beer. What do I mean? I mean that citizens of a nation deserve a choice when it comes to the beer that they drink. While a laissez faire market should be determining the price and availability of beer, the choice of brand should not be governed by a single corporation. Here in America we take it for granted. We can buy hundreds of different brands of beer, unfortunately the market shares show that we generally purchase Miller-Coors or Anheuser-Busch. These two companies account for eighty percent of the U.S. market, and forty percent of the world market. Now, the plot thickens when you note that Anheuser-Busch also has forty-nine percent of the Mexican conglomerate, Grupo-Modelo.

What does this mean? Well for the time being, it means that corporate beer, controls the costs of beer to you and me the consumer. It also means, that through millions of lobbying dollars that these companies are bossing around labor unions (which I am okay with) but they also seem to have politicians in their back pocket. These companies are able to threaten the closing of local plants and loss of local jobs to curtail any sort of tax increase on their products. For example, a recently proposed ten cent tax increase, per gallon of beer was proposed in the northeast. The result was a three cent increase after the closure of many plants across the politicians constituents cities was threatened. These companies are in fact bullying our form of government. Corrupt much?

I am all about free market, but where do you draw the line? These companies are no longer even based in America. While they may possess a “headquarters building” in Chicago, or St. Louis, business is conducted from Belgium (in the case of Anheuser-Busch, owned by conglomerate InBev). So, this is where I make my moral plee to buy local beer, keep the money in the American economy… not to mention, the beer is better, the jobs stay here, and we all end up happier.

Just something to keep in mind the next time that you reach for that case of Bud Light or Miller Lite.

When it comes to drinking “cheap beer” I usually grab a case of Lone Star, but not everyone can handle Texan beer.

Marin Report on the Beer Duopoly.