The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "monopoly" ...
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Come About
An AWIN investigation into the Navy destroyer fleet and its accompanying combat systems strongly suggest the service will have to upend its plans for their development, effectively solidifying the grip of incumbent contractors on the work at the very time the service is trying to break such monopolies.
Tags: Navy; destroyer; combat; monopoly; contractors
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Bomboozled, a Story of Liquor and Money
Profits from North Carolina's monopoly on retail liquor are supposed to flow back to the state. However, the investigation uncovers waste and corruption are causing the liquor boards to lose money.
Tags: alcohol; liquor; waste; Alcoholic Beverage Control; retail liquor
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The Partners Effect
The Partners Effect is a series that "focuses on an out-of-balance healthcare finance system that rewards a few big hospitals and pays them far more for work, even when there is no evidence that the higher-priced care produces healthier patients. The stories detail how New England's biggest healthcare network, Partners HealthCare, is increasingly using its marketplace clout to export its expensive brand of medicine into the suburbs, imperiling community hospitals, and how its cozy relationship with the state's largest insurer has helped to trigger a healthcare cost crisis.
Tags: hospitals; healthcare costs; monopoly; high-priced care; finance system; higher fees
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Leonard Lawson
State taxes payers were forced to pay tens of millions of dollars because of the influence of blacktop contractors over the Kentucky Department of Highways. The man who headed the largest blacktop monopoly was Leonard Lawson who was indicted on charges of bribery, conspiracy and obstruction of justice.
Tags: contract; asphalt; Elmo Greer & Sons; transportation; roads; Phillip Dufour;
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Big Fish in a Big Pond
"An investigative profile of Frank Dulcich's Pacific Seafood Group, which reavealed a crippling monopoly that has overtaken the West Coast seafood business, affecting fishermen, smaller seafood buyers, the prices consumers pay for wild seafood and the availability of the product"
Tags: seafood business
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Power to the People?
This investigation reveals how rural electric cooperatives have become unregulated monopolies that often take advantage of their unknowing members. Many cooperatives haven't elected new board members for decades, and members are not aware of destructive changes made by the governing boards. Some cooperatives even outsourced work to for-profit companies.
Tags: utilities; electricity; power companies; business; local government
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Internal Combustion: How Corporations and Governments Addicted the World to Oil and Derailed the Alternatives
Author Edwin Black discusses the world's use of oil, asserting that it is corporate greed that has kept oil a prominent part of society. He examines the history of the dependence going back 100 years, "expos(ing) a century of lies about internal combustion that arose from a millennium of monopolistic conduct in energy."
Tags: Oil; corporations; energy; monopolies; environmental concerns; politics; energy lobby
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Flying Gas Prices: The Shell Game
This investigation uncovered an oil company scandal: Shell Oil Company was planning to close a refinery, even though it was making big profits. The investigation found that, even though Shell Oil claimed the oil field was tapped out, the real motivation for the closure was to fix oil prices.
Tags: oil; petroleum; whistleblower; gas; corporate documents; business reporting; monopoly
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Browser Bruiser. Microsoft and Justice end a skirmish, yet war could escalate. Company agrees to unbundle internet software; will regulators widen case? Why Netscape still frets.
This article talks about Microsoft's struggle with Netscape and the Justice Department. It also includes some background information which explains how Microsoft got into antitrust problems, and what the company is doing and has done to resolve those problems.
Tags: Microsoft; Justice Department; Netscape; Bill Gates; Internet; Internet Explorer; antitrust; monopoly; computers; software
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Making Waves. As U.S. trade grow, shipping cartels get a bit more scrutiny. The price fixing pact hurt consumers, critics say; lines defend the system. How Philadelphia took a hit.
According to the article, "Every two weeks, in an unobtrusive office building here (in Rutherford, N.J.), about 20 shipping-line managers gather for their usual meeting. They sit around a long conference table, exchange small talk over bagels and coffee and then begin discussing what they will charge to move cargo across the Atlantic Ocean. All very routine, except for one detail: They don't work for the same company. Each represents a different shipping line, supposedly competing for business. Under U.S. antitrust law, most people doing this would end up in court."
Tags: U.S. trade; shipping; monopoly; business; boats; antitrust; cargo