Corporations can oppress millions

While I lean towards a positive view of business, I don’t need to look far to discover countless ways that corporations oppress humans. For every piece of software that improves human life there are ten that degrade it. A visit to the grocery store is a weekly reminder that most grocery stores are dehumanizing.

Americans have an odd relationship to this reality. Our history textbooks generally associate corporations with progress, innovation, and growth, while most of the negative features: slavery, colonialism, and war, are associated with governments, often just a leader. There’s a dark period in the industrial revolution, but that stain only serves to ingrain gratitude in our “enlighted” modern corporations.