The supposed "problem" you have observed is in actuality a *protocol*.
You can't "solve" a protocol, you can only replace it with a better one. #dmutc
"But Mark, why would you say you I can't solve a protocol?"
Because it has been put in place to solve an underlying problem. A problem that you haven't even noticed or identified, due to over focusing on the protocol itself. A parallel to #ChestertonsFence comes to mind.
"But Mark, the protocol has certain serious issue to it?"
Is the issue with protocol worse than the original problem that is being solved by the protocol? Is your proposed new protocol better than the current protocol?
Buyer collusion (or seller collusion) is largely orthogonal to whether it's capitalism - can happen under any economy with price discovery. You are asking about statism - whether state plays favors with pricing.
1/ When a problem reoccurs several times in short time, you have a process problem. If the organization is sizable, it needs an external consultant to channel the already-existing knowledge through decisionmakers to execution.
2/ "but the consultants are expensive"
Consultants provide service that is nigh impossible to keep & foster in-house:
they enable the middle managers to make an about-face without losing face.
Moreover, the *strength* of their influence is proportional to the budget.
3/ The consultants find & extract knowledge and ability to fix that is already present in the organization, and then re-frame it from "a hare-brained and expensive idea" to "everybody does it as the best practice".
2/ The first point - a necessary technological development:
at present *propaganda/marketing/PR* is much more cost-effective than engineering, manufacture. This makes propaganda pervasive and highly influential on the society, making people & businesses highly subject to it.
3/ A sub-point regarding propaganda/marketing/PR:
need a cultural trend that treats negative propaganda at significant scale like a social attack, and reacts accordingly. At present pushback to it is strongly disallowed.
2/ Be pseudonymous online. Establish and use a long-running identity that is worth maintaining. Exchange it every couple years. Have side identities for when necessary.
Some of those could well be *shared* with others allied with you. 4chan's "Anonymous" identity comes to mind.