I chuckle when I hear corporations run America
Very well meaning and smart people are always saying that corporations buy politicians and have too much influence on policy in America.
Well lets visit some of the most powerful corporations of the last decades and see what their influence got them.
There was IBM, so powerful the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice, Southern District of NY spent years in litigation to stop the monster. No antitrust verdict ever came in, IBM wasted away as many corporations did when faced with new competitors. Do you fear IBM today? Many people did years ago.
Xerox was a power, Kodak was a power, GE was a power, US Steel was a power, General Motors was a power (does anyone fear GM today, or do we hope it will eek out existence long enough to pay our father’s retirement?), Bell Telephone was so powerful it was broken up into regional companies (wasted effort as the internet made it irrelevant and other companies took over its market), Exxon-Mobile was a great power, until it was no longer a great power.
But somehow their power was not sufficient to ensure their survival in the Dow Jones Industries.
The department of Indian Affairs still exists. The major universities still exist with the same institutions at the top that were at the top 200 years ago (Harvard, Yale, Princeton). But the corporation which run America somehow waste away to be replaced by new social media companies. Weird power they have that does not insure even their survival.
Chuckle.