Sarbanes-Oxley turned going public into a $3 million annual compliance nightmare. IPOs dropped 76% in the decade after 2002 -- from 457 average annual IPOs in the 1990s to just 108 from 2003-2012. The compliance costs hit small companies hardest (obviously). Goldman Sachs absorbs SOX requirements as a rounding error. Your innovative startup burns through Series B funding just to satisfy auditors who've never built anything. Established corporations love this arrangement. Why compete with disruptive newcomers when Congress erected a regulatory moat around your market position? Private equity now buys promising companies before they can threaten incumbents through public markets. The supposed "investor protection" created the most concentrated corporate landscape in American history.