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In Addition Rockefeller Summary

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John D. Rockefeller is known as having been the richest man in America, the first billionaire and creator of Standard Oil; he made the modern American economy what it is today and is a well-known symbol and a house-hold name for a monopoly. In Addition Rockefeller was also one the most hated men in the country. Ida Tarbell is one of his many critics. Tarbell had firsthand experience with Rockefeller. Tarbell and her family were one of the many individuals whom were ruined by Rockefeller’s immoral practices. In addition to first-hand experience Tarbell also had much anecdotal evidence from other individuals. Individuals, who once were fearful to criticize Rockefeller, then opened up little by little to reveal their true thoughts on Rockefeller and support Tarbell. Her first article about the Monopoly was a hit and for the next years the people were gripped by Tarbell’s exposé that would soon spell disaster for Rockefeller’s Empire. Tarbell’s criticism of Rockefeller is the essence of the modern Corporate Social Responsibility theory in which she believes corporations and individuals such as Rockefeller have an obligation to give back to the society which gives them their power.
Rockefeller’s insatiable appetite for money led to many changes in society and this influenced Tarbell to eventually establish herself as an influential female writer in a well established Magazine company. Tarbell’s “A Character Study, Rockefeller” is one of her most popular and influential pieces. In it she states that, “From him we have received no impulse to public duty, only lessons in evading it for private greed; no stimulus to nobler ideals, only a lesson in the further deification of gold; no example of enlarged and noble living; only one of concealment and evasion; no impulse to free thinking, only a lesson in obscuring vital ethical issues by dressing them in the garbs of piety and generosity. None of those higher things which the public has a right to demand from the man to whom the public permits great power are returned to it by Mr. Rockefeller. For Mr. Rockefeller has none of these things to give. He has nothing but Money… He is not a great man, not a “human man.” He is a machine – a money machine” In this quote Tarbell

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