There's no place left to hide from the crucible of competition

I started writing about business for The Boston Globe in 1984. A lot has changed since then. But in this, my last column for the Globe, I'd like to spend a minute talking about something that may have changed the most: the intensity of competition.

The business world has always been competitive, of course. But by the standards of today, the competition of the past seems almost gentlemanly -- more like fencing than football. Take the auto industry. The ''Big Three" carmakers competed, yet all three signed identical contracts with the unions, guaranteeing that no firm would have a cost advantage. Each of the three big television networks strived to put on the best shows, but the losers always survived, and if they waited long enough, they eventually got to be number one.

The ''Big Three" have given way to at least the big six and the three major networks compete with, God knows, how many channels. But more has changed than the number of players. Like homes battered by a hurricane, businesses have seen the walls that once protected them blown away. Thanks to deregulation, globalization, and technology, many companies have no place left to hide from the competition.

The change is most dramatic in industries like airlines and telecommunications. But it is apparent even in businesses where the rules haven't changed. Hollywood is ailing, in part, because there are too many companies releasing too many movies. Beyond that, the studios have to compete for the audience's time with everything from video games to iPods.

Newspapers are in trouble because the Internet has given readers a way to get information for free and advertisers a new way to reach their customers. Newspapers are also losing ground to rivals that until recently didn't show up on their radar screens: think Google and Yahoo.

The drug industry once was inoculated against competition. Patent protection created franchises that lasted for years. These days the ranks of those bulletproof franchises are shrinking. The stock price of Pfizer, the most successful drug company, is down 21 percent this year as investors worry that competition from generics will erode its profits.

Any fair discussion of competition has to acknowledge the benefits it has brought. The biggest one: cheap stuff. You can go into a discount store today and buy a pair of jeans for roughly the same price you would have paid 20 years ago. Cars keep getting better, even as their prices stay flat. Refinancing a mortgage is cheap and speedy because so many companies want your business. Service has improved too. Think about it: Five years ago, would the cashier at your drug store ask: Did you find everything you were looking for?

Then there is the dark side. It is hard to feel secure in a world where you are constantly looking over your shoulder, wondering if someone is gaining on you. That insecurity may explain why consumer confidence never seems to rise much, even when the economic statistics suggest things are rosy.

On a more practical level, intense competition means your paycheck, your healthcare benefits, and your pension are always at risk. They may be necessities to you, but to your employer they may be costs that make it difficult to compete with the company down the street -- or in China.

Like nuclear weapons, competition is here to stay. No one is going to disarm unilaterally. So we are going to have to learn to live in a rough and tumble world. The trick is striking a balance: providing a semblance of security to people without damaging the nation's competitive position. Inevitably, the government is going to have to play a bigger role in health insurance, pensions, and retraining. If the Democrats can package all that, they may find a way to get back into power. It is something to keep your eye on.

I've been lucky. For most of the last four years I've had use of this space every Sunday to wrestle with the economic issues of the day. Writing the column has been great fun. I hope it was half as much fun to read. Thanks for reading.

Charles Stein is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at stein@globe.com.