Your health is more important to us than the business.(John D. Rockefeller and the oil industry) That shows that he cares more about the workers health than his own business. He approached the idea of the standard oil family and he tried to get every person in his family to work.(John D. Rockefeller and the Oil industry) That proves that he believes in working hard. From his actions he is overall not a robber baron because he pays his
John D. Rockefeller was called a robber baron because many people believed he used unethical business practices to amass his extraordinary wealth. One of the most known was his practice of demanding rebates from railroads. Because Standard Oil shipped such large amounts of oil by rail, Rockefeller insisted that the railroads offer him rebates, or a discounted rate. This policy gave Standard
Not long after his first company took off, in 1870, he created Standard Oil Co., which was a combination of a few of the other businesses he had started. Rockefeller used refineries to extract oil, rather than some of his competitors who preferred to use oil rigs. What truly helped Rockefeller rise above his competitors was actually undercutting their prices, and even offering money to railroad companies to only ship materials to him, which caused his competitors’ businesses to go bankrupt. He used a business tactic called the trust, where he took shares in other companies, offering the owners a place on the board of directors and dividends in the company. This tactic gave Rockefeller more control over his competitors’ businesses, which affected everyone else negatively.
Rockefeller had an admiration for his integrity as a businessman and had a strong calling to his faith. His mother was a key role in his growth in faith and his father had taught him the importance of saving money. His values had always been grounded in tending to those who are less fortunate and quickly gain his respects to the business of producing oil. He had always had a fascination with oil and one of the members of his church, Samuel Andrews, who was an investor in oil. Both Andrews and Rockefeller joined together to make the business which would be called the Standard Oil Company.
Rockefeller was so ruthless and wealthy he was called The Leviathan. Rockefeller got wealthy through monopolies ( trust) a monopoly was when a corporation buys out its competition so they can have full price control so they could charge however much they wanted for that product which means they eliminated the free market
Rockefeller was also one of the most successful wealthy Gilded Age entrepreneurs. Although Rockefeller did make a name for himself in the oil industry,supplying the U.S with oil, and creating the Standard Oil Company;his road to power was paved with the pain and suffering of others due to his malicious behavior. He should be remembered as a Robber Baron because of his attempts at monopoly, malicious behavior to those who stood in his way, and especially the treatment of his workers in order to get the wealth he desired. J.D. Rockefeller used tactics such as vertical integration, using rebates to transport his oil for cheaper prices, and using ruthless methods to eliminate the competition. Rockefellers ruthlessness lead him to be very successful up until his fatal encountered with Ida Tarbell.
They began to partner up with a lot of different companies and began to build their company more and more. After a while of the government noticing, what exactly he and others were doing, the government began to punish those who used monopoly to create bigger businesses. Rockefeller then went to distributing his company among others making is fair. The government didn’t see this as a good thing although as they created the antitrust laws and everything he had worked for fell to the end. Rockefeller retired and became the Rockefeller foundation.
Rockefeller took advantage of the well oiled railroad system and created what is known as a monopoly. As seen in Document 7, George Rice tells a short tale of how Rockefeller drove him to a breaking point as Rockefeller owned most of the oil companies and also had the lowest prices that George himself and many other competitors couldn’t compete with. As Rockefeller became one of the wealthiest men in America, he used others downfalls to raise himself to the top. Many other people including members of congress even full under the shadow of gaining personal earnings based on controlling the railroads. As seen in Document 3, there were heavier hands at play in the congress and as shown there were many who participated.
John D. Rockefeller in my opinion is a robber baron; The term robber baron was used in the 19th century to describe a group of industrialist who were creating enormous personal fortunes. Many people believed he used unethical business practices to amass his extraordinary wealth. John had a drive to become one one of the richest people in America. During Rockefeller's time the average person was making around 8 to 10 dollars per week, but Rockefeller was worth millions. Rockefeller did use some tactics that were questionable.
Coming with a successful business is people trying to find faults in your greatness. Rockefeller was a Captain of Industry, he helped improve the inventions we already had by making oil more readily available. By doing this he made a fortune which made people believe that he was unable to be trusted, but all of these suspicions were incorrect, Rockefeller made his money honestly and helped our country thrive and become who we are today. Rockefeller had competition in the oil industry but,
Rockefeller was a robber baron because he used ruthless and unethical means to acquire his wealth, he would abuse his power with his workers. On history.com, John D. History.com states "Critics accused Rockefeller of engaging in unethical practices, such as predatory pricing and colluding with railroads to eliminate his competitors to gain a monopoly in the industry. In 1911, the U.S. Supreme Court found Standard Oil violated anti-trust laws and ordered it to dissolve." Rockefeller's shady business states, "Rockefeller controlled pipelines and arranged for secret, discriminatory railroad rates, which allowed him to cut prices and force competitors out of business. Rockefeller's conglomerate of companies was called a “trust” or “combination."
During that time he set standards for what it means to be a billionaire. Like how Rockefeller took the principle of waste wants not and applied it to a byproduct of kerosene and finding a use for it, and now gasoline is a global commodity that everyone needs uses and sales. Rockefeller also used his money that he made for good and became not just a great businessman but also a great humanitarian and started the trend of millionaires and billionaires to do the same. Finally at the end of Rockefeller's career as times were changing so to was how business was being conducted no longer are the days of monopolies because of the trust busting court case against Rockefeller. All in all, Rockefeller has been a man who helped shape and builds America after the civil war.
Rockefeller. Rockefeller was known as one of the most ruthless and heartless businessmen that this time due to the way that he gave little regard towards the businesses that he destroyed. One example of this was George Rice, a man whose life was utterly destroyed over a single ultimatum. During the nineteenth century, George Rice was a businessman in the oil business until John D. Rockefeller did not like the competition and offered him an ultimatum of either having his business destroyed or selling it to Rockefeller for a significant amount less than what it was worth. When Rice declined, Rockefeller began making it impossible for him to run his business through acts such as lowering wages on Rice’s oil so the people lost money and owning train cars and making the price of the railroad use more expensive
Krasner continues to state that Rockefeller did not have a good relationship with the Clark brothers, but Rockefeller was so determined to continue to expand that he bought them out. By buying out his partners, he was ready to take over and dominate the oil industry. Have you ever heard the saying “no one ever becomes successful by being honest”? In Rockefeller’s story, this saying is very true. According to Sara Ann McGill in “John D. Rockefeller” many of his business deals were illegal and immoral.
Rockefeller most often just bought his competition out. Since he was so rich and powerful, he had the ability to lower his prices so low, that his competitors could no longer sell their goods, and were forced to sell their business to Standard Oil. Another tactic he used was purposely driving his competitors to bankruptcy. This was the most brutal. There was a case in the earlier years of Standard Oil, where he drove Cornelius Vanderbilt, the second most powerful businessman in the U.S. into the dirt.
