The elephant in the room is the contradiction between laissez-faire, libertarian free market capitalism where everyone is free to enter into contracts or decline to do so, and de-facto monopolies where essential functions of society are taken over by monoliths.
"Consensual" collaborative actions by large market players have historically been heavily regulated. You're not typically allowed to telephone your biggest competitor and "politely request" that they double their prices, on the condition that you will do the same. That's because we recognize that there is simply a limited supply of competitors, and once a company gets big enough to throw its weight around it has a responsibility to be "fair".
"Consensual" collaborative actions by large market players have historically been heavily regulated. You're not typically allowed to telephone your biggest competitor and "politely request" that they double their prices, on the condition that you will do the same. That's because we recognize that there is simply a limited supply of competitors, and once a company gets big enough to throw its weight around it has a responsibility to be "fair".