Captains of Industry or Robber Barons? Robber Barons!!! "Robber Barons" can be best described as men who established monopolies, crushed any competitors they had, raised prices, and exploited their workers. In my eyes, men like Andrew Carnegre, John D. Rockefellar, J.P. Morgan, and Cornelius Vanderbilt were all robber barons.
Cornelius Vanderbilt was probably the first robber baron. He made all his money from exploiting steamship lines and railroads. Now personally, I think a man that was worth $100 million when he died could've afforded to pay his workers more than .10ÃÂâ and hour.
John D. Rockefellar was also known as a robber baron, and for good reasons too. Since Rockefellar owned almost all of the oil industry, he could lower prices to an unheard of level, but still make money while making his competitors drop out of the business. A great example is that the price of oil in 1865 was $24.67
English: "Cornelius Vanderbilt, head-and-shoulders...
Cornelius Vanderbilt
Cornelius Vanderbilt, three-quarter view.per barrel. Then in 1872, the price dropped to $9.66, and by 1884, it reached $3.36. What a way to make competitors fail! I guess some people could have seen Rockefellar as a "good man" for lowering his prices. B/c that way it was cheap for the public. He was not acting this way to please others though. He did it all for himself"æ for more money.
Speaking of total scumbags, there's J.P. Morgan who once was heard saying " I owe the public nothing." He once sold 5,000 defective carbines to General Freemont. The only reason he made so much money was b/c he practiced the tactics of pillage, fraud, and distortion.
When talking about the actual robber barons all by themselves, some people could argue that they "weren't that bad of people," but when you talk about the conditions their workers had to work...