19TH Century Industrial Tycoons Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

19TH Century Industrial Tycoons - Assignment Example ng a Robber Baron is a term that was used in the 19th century to refer to businessmen who used exploitation as a means of acquiring their wealth (Josephson, 2010). Rockfeller was known as the first man to become a millionaire in America being termed as the richest man in the world then. Anyone would have thought that he came from a well up family considering the immense wealth he had accumulated. But contrary to this Rockfeller came from a humble beginning in a small town in New York (McNeese, 2009). Despite the great inspiration he offers as a persistent man in his journey to the top, Rockfeller’s reputation is seen as that of a Robber baron. This is so because of the crude ways he used to drive his business way up to the top. The fact that he created a monopoly in the oil business by eliminating his other competitors in the field confirms my opinion that Rockfeller was a greedy man thirsting for more and more money. This is clearly shown when he used to collect rebates from the railroads and hence he was in a position to sell his oil at a cheaper price in certain places (McNeese, 2009). This was a move for him to eliminate local competition by local oil dealers. Rockfeller is on another occasion demonstrated as a robber baron when he created a trust so as to bring together a multitude of oil refineries in a bid to form one big oil refining company (McNeese, 2009). This I believe was in an attempt to strain the competition by merging all the smaller oil refiners in to one big corporation which he owned. By paying small wages to his workers despite the millions that he was making from his oil business, is a move I see as unfair. This is because his business was making huge profits to be able to pay the best wages that the industry deserved. The fact he controlled the rail corporation gave Rockfeller an upper hand over other oil companies. This is why he used intimidation to those who failed to supply the oil to his company demonstrating how dubious his means