Question

Rockefeller was truly a monster monopolist whose power over the oil industry harmed the public far more than his charitable giving ever helped .
do you agree or disagree with this statement?why?

Answer 1

It's a completely silly statement. The first evidence against it is that Rockefeller had no force at all at his command, ever. He had no guns with which to threaten people. He had no law to back him up, he could not put people in prison if they displeased him. Every scrap of wealth he ever acquired he acquired by free trade with people: he provided something people wanted (typically, kerosene to light their houses at much lower prices than anyone else) and they freely traded their money for it. He also hired many people, and of course that, too, was purely voluntary: he offered good wages, and people took the jobs because they wanted them.

So every bit of the "power" he acquired over the oil industry was power his customers gave him, voluntarily, because they thought he was doing something more useful to them than anyone else in the industry. He acquired 0% of it through force.

In short, the great mass of people who lived at the time already had a chance to "vote" -- with their purchases and job decisions -- on how they felt about Rockefeller and what he did, and what they clearly felt, based on what they did, is that he was an immensely useful and helpful guy, who brought great value into their lives. They figured he was the Steve Jobs of the day, and they loved his "iPad" (cheap and easily available kerosene and gasoline).

The people who didn't like Rockefeller were, of course, those who lost the power that he gained. Other people in the oil industry, for example, who lost business that customers transferred to Rockefeller. They sure didn't like him, the same way GM and Chrysler don't like Toyota. Other haters were in government, the academy (univesities and schools), and the media (newspapers and magazines), because they, too, lost power that went to Rockefeller. Power of a more subtle kind, however: the power to set the terms of public debate, the power to influence people as to what is right and good, and how they should live their lives.

If Joe Reporter at Muckraker Magazine wants to have influence over his readers, and sell a lot of magazines, he wants his readers to believe only he understands them, and other influences in their lives (e.g. their employers) are corrupt and evil, and only by listening to Joe -- and buying his magazine! -- can you live a good and free and happy life. Naturally, any employer that provides good jobs is going to reduce Joe's influence, and Joe will sell fewer magazines, and have to settle for a smaller Christmas bonus.

Likewise, legislators and politicians have more power when their constituents feel a sense of alarm about the institutions in their lives -- when the politicitans can convince the people that they can't solve problems on their own, and need the force of government to help. That makes people vote for greater government power, and of course for higher taxes, which pay for better salaries for government workers. All good stuff! A way to afford that nice second house in the country! But when private industry provides goods jobs, nice wages, and cheap products, all that tends to make the citizens wonder why, exactly, they should be voting more power over their lives to a bunch of lawyers in the capital, and why they should be writing bigger checks to the state and Federal treasuries.

Same for the academy. It needs people to be worried about their private lives, to sell its proposed solutions. Why trouble to read -- and buy! -- a book written by a professor if you think you understand history just fine already, or have no need to correct mistakes handed down from the past? A happy people is not a dissatisfied people, dissatisfaction is the root of broad change, and broad change is exactly what the academy, the media, and government "sell."