You're right that there's a balance, but now it's unbalanced toward fusions and consolidations.
I always start in English.
We have to find that balance which, in my opinion, continues to elude us. I am referring to medium-sized companies. Of course, the situation isn't necessarily any better for the very small companies, since they do not have the means to cope with a long-term crisis. However, medium-sized companies can manage to stay afloat despite market fluctuations. It is easier for a medium-sized company than it would be for a large plant to turn itself around and produce another type of commodity when there is a drop in demand for a given product.
Moreover, medium-sized companies are usually closer to the community and that makes it more difficult to lay people off, since there is a chance that one will run into them at the grocery store; that does not happen with large companies whose head office is somewhere else. It can happen within the same province. I am not pointing the finger at other countries or other provinces or at anyone in particular, but with this management style, one is more removed from the employees. There are plants throughout the world, and they are opened or shut down according to market forces, without necessarily giving too much thought to the needs of the people who are affected by these fluctuations.