FREE ESSAY ON ROBBER BARON'S

ROBBER BARON'S

Robert Allen
92845
Robber Barons
Then and Now
Robber Barons, a term used in the late 1800s and early 1900s to describe a businessman
who made an enormous amount of money, today we would call them billionaires. It was not
really the fact they made an extreme amount of wealth, it was more the way they made it.
In all the cases the acquiring of wealth was done in what was considered a ruthless manor
and unscrupulous ways. A robber baron was more interested in acquiring wealth than the
safety of his employees, the amount of work hours performed in a week, or the amount of
wage being paid for a days work.
For example Andrew Carnegie(the robber baron of the steel industry), he was instrumental
in starting the 72 hour work week, paying out less than fair wages and having dangerous
working conditions.
The robber barons were known for their business tactics that would enable them to amass a
wealth by monopolies. They would corner the market on a product or service and make it
almost impossible to get, accept through them.
One such person was James B. Duke (robber baron of the tobacco market).James Duke started
marketing tobacco from his fathers tobacco farm at an early age. He developed a market
for tobacco though advertising. When the market he developed, started growing he started
buying up other tobacco companies in order to be the only supplier of the product. James
Duke eventually formed The Great American Tobacco Co. which became the biggest supplier
of cigarettes in the world.
One thing the Robber Barons of today and yesterday have in common is monopolies. If it at
all possible, the Robber Baron or billionaires as we call them today, would try to corner
the entire market on their product or service, making it difficult for competition in
their particular industry.
James Duke did it by making a market for cigarettes and cigars and buying up his
competition so he was the biggest company to supply the product. 
Andrew Carnegie cornered the market on the steel industry and made the first high rise
building. He was the only business in his field therefore he could set his prices and up
his profits.
Other Robber Barons in various markets were William Vanderbilt, he monopolized the
railroad business allowing him to set his own prices for freight and passage. John D.
Rockefeller monopolized the oil industry with Standard Oil company.
Today AT&T, the phone company, before deregulation controlled the vast majority of the
phone services, thereby monopolizing the phone services. 
American Airlines, there unscrupulous business tactics would drive out competitors from
areas they wished to control by having price wars until the opposition could no longer
compete and would have to close their doors for business.
But the biggest and wealthiest of them all, Bill Gates owner of Microsoft Corporation
created an operating system for computers to work with and the market to sell that
system. Before Bill Gates came along computers were only an informational source. What
ever was programed into them was retrievable but you could not add information to them.
Basically they were just a big file cabinet. Bill Gates made it to where you can talk to
the computer and add information to them. This made them more user friendly and a very
usable tool for personal and business use. But just like the Robber Barons of yesterday
Gates cornered the market for his software by orchestrating a marketing plan that would
require computer companies to pay him X amount of dollars for every computer they sold,
whether or not the computer had his software on it or not. Now if you think about it, the
computer companies had no choice but to put his software on the computers they sold. Kind
of sounds like a monopoly to me.
Philanthropy
The other side to the Robber Baron coin. For some unknown reason the Robber Barons felt
it necessary to give back enormous amounts of their wealth to the society they took if
from, or maybe a better way to put it is earned it from? It was done in a manner that for
the most part immortalized the giver. For instance James Duke or the Duke Endowment gave
money to several Universities. This in turn eventually got his name on one, Duke
University in Washington, DC. Duke also gave money to hospitals, childcare institutions
for blacks and whites and the Methodist church.
Andrew Carnegie felt so strongly about philanthropy that he was inspired to write the
landmark essay The Gospel of Wealth. Some would say Carnegie was only out for self
glorification because he would build and finance libraries but neglect to supply them
with the much needed books. Carnegie was quoted as saying, The man who dies thus rich
dies disgraced. Before it was all said and done through Carnegie's philanthropist
donations, he would give away nearly 350 million dollars or close to 90% of his lifelong
acquired wealth.
Others considered philanthropist were, J.P. Morgan, he gave away a vast amount of his
wealth to various institutions. Henry C. Frick, Andrew Carnegie's right hand man runner
of his companies. A millionaire by his own rights also a philanthropist who gave a lot of
his money back to society.
Perhaps one of the most well known modern day philanthropist would be George Soros. Soros
is accredited for giving away 1 billion dollars over a matter of days back in 1992. Soros
made his fortune by investing, but not merely investing in the market as we know it but
investing in entire countries and their misfortunate collapse of their economies. Soros
made this billion dollars by currency speculation, betting correctly on the collapse of
the British pound. Soros devoted most of his money back to Eastern Europe, where he has
set up foundations in 25 separate countries.
Now if we were to take a look at Bill Gates who has been accredited as being the richest
man in the world today, we would not see a lot of giving back to the community. Gates has
had some bouts of giving but considering his wealth one might say it is trivial. And if
you were to take a look at the reasoning behind his giving it would show up as still
being to his favor. Such as giving a small amount of computers to the schools so as to
allow the students access to the internet through his own proxy server, thereby realizing
a profit.
Conclusion
It would seem that most of the Robber Barons of yesterday and today made their money by
unscrupulous tactics, or monopolies. These monopolies were created by the Robber Barons
themselves and by what ever means possible they made every effort to keep their strong
hold in their business as long as possible. Now there is a downside to this although they
were over bearing in their business tactics, stepping on who ever they had to make a
profit there seem to be a certain amount of guilt involved. For unknown reasons they felt
it necessary to give back a large amount of that profit to better society. Perhaps this
could be looked at as more of them feeling like they could be in control of man kinds
destiny, or by giving something back the guilt would be lifted for being so ruthless in
the business world.
And as far as Bill Gates goes perhaps one day he will wake up and realize enough is
enough and be more of a philanthropist himself.
Reference Sources
Biography.com
http://www.biography.com/cgi-bin/biomain.cgi 
James B. Duke
http://www.duke.edu/web/Archives/history/jbduke.html
Andrew Carnegie
http://www.worth.com/articles/M9611F04.html
Andrew Carnegie
http://www.worth.com/articles/Z9611C01.html
Fighting Modern Day Robber Barons
http://www.amcity.com/denver/stories/1997/01/27/editorial3.html
Forward Thinking
http://www.worth.com/articles/Z9611R.html
Return of the Robber Barons
http://worldpolicy.org/americas/usa/fasttrack.html
Bill Gates, Robber Baron
http://www.businessweek.com/1998/03/b3561030.htm
Robber Barons
http://econ161.berkeley.edu/Econ_Articles/carnegie/DeLong_Moscow_paper2.html