A Quote by Ida Tarbell

Now, if the Standard Oil Company were the only concern in the country guilty of the practices which have given it monopolistic power, this story never would have been written. Were it alone in these methods, public scorn would long ago have made short work of the Standard Oil Company. But it is simply the most conspicuous type of what can be done by these practices. The methods it employs with such acumen, persistency, and secrecy are employed by all sorts of business men, from corner grocers up to bankers. If exposed, they are excused on the ground that this is business.
One of the most depressing features of the ethical side of the matter is that instead of such methods arousing contempt they are more or less openly admired. And this is logical. Canonise 'business success,' and men who made a success like that of the Standard Oil Trust become national heroes!
My father was a middle manager at an oil company, but I never knew anything about his work. Whatever business acumen I have just got gleaned over the years.
From the 1920s into the 1940s, Britain's standard of living was supported by oil from Iran. British cars, trucks, and buses ran on cheap Iranian oil. Factories throughout Britain were fueled by oil from Iran. The Royal Navy, which projected British power all over the world, powered its ships with Iranian oil.
Some years ago one oil company bought a fertilizer company, and every other major oil company practically ran out and bought a fertilizer company. And there was no more damned reason for all these oil companies to buy fertilizer companies, but they didn't know exactly what to do, and if Exxon was doing it, it was good enough for Mobil and vice versa.
I've been saying for a long time, and I think you'll agree, because I said it to you once, had we taken the oil - and we should have taken the oil - ISIS would not have been able to form either, because the oil was their primary source of income. And now they have the oil all over the place, including the oil - a lot of the oil in Libya, which was another one of her disasters.
The ruler who possesses methods of government does not follow the good that happens by chance but practices according to necessary principles. Law, methods, and power must be employed for government: these constitute its 'necessary principles.'
Nike used to be known as Blue Ribbon Sports. What's now Sara Lee used to be Consolidated Foods. And Exxon was once Standard Oil Company of New Jersey. These were name changes that worked. But for all the ones that do, there are 10 or 20 that don't.
The company that employed me strived only to serve up the cheapest fare that the customer would tolerate, churn it out as fast as possible, and charge as much as they could get away with. If it were possible to do so, the company would sell what all businesses of its kind dream about selling, creating that which all of our efforts were tacitly supposed to achieve: the ultimate product -- Nothing. And for this product they would command the ultimate price -- Everything.
In 1972, Texaco Oil Company, in partnership with PetroEcuador, the state-run oil company of Ecuador, began to drill for oil in the jungles of the Ecuadorian Amazon.
Almost all of the demand for oil that suddenly pushed prices up was speculative demand. People began to speculate not only in stocks and bonds and real estate, but also in commodities. The market went up for old tankers, which were used simply to store oil in. A lot of the oil was simply being stored for trading, not used.
The best business in the world is a well run oil company. The second best business in the world is a badly run oil company.
It is much more convenient not to be a public company. As a private company you don't have to give information to the public. Secrecy is an important factor of success in the commodity business.
In 1979 I teamed up with my friend and business partner, Bill DeWitt, and together we formed an oil and gas company that invested through limited partnerships in oil and gas exploration.
I would have been fired a hundred times at a company run by M.B.A.’s. But I never went into business to make money. I went into business so that I could do interesting things that hadn’t been done before.
Without competition we would be clinging to the clumsy antiquated processes of farming and manufacture and the methods of business of long ago, and the twentieth would be no further advanced than the eighteenth century.
I decided to write the book to open the eyes of the people of how corrupt John D. Rockefeller company was and the unfair ways he used to be successful. I wanted the people to know the truth about the Standard Oil Company.
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