John D. Rockefeller’s Financial Career in the Gilded Age

The United States has always been a juggernaut on the world stage. One of the biggest components that has added to its renowned strength has been its free market economy. The United State’s economy has made it possible for people like Rockefeller to amass huge amounts of wealth and use it to fund other economic ventures. If we didn’t have rich entrepreneurs creating jobs for the middle class and pushing innovated new technologies; America could have never reached the level of prosperity it has today.

One great economic figure during the older United States was Rockefeller.

John D. Rockefeller became an icon of the industrial revolution. During his lifetime he changed the face of business by developing new outside the box strategies in order to pursue financial success. He did so by combining his business views and religious beliefs. As a result he founded the Standard Oil Company, which was one of the first types of businesses during its time. This company helped Rockefeller become known for his successful self developed competitive strategies. During John D. Rockefeller’s financial career in The Gilded Age, he used many unethical practices to ensure that local competitors would die out and he would have control over the market. In order to do this he used what was known as horizontal integration. This name became the label for the process of eliminating any potential competition from the market that one wishes to succeed in. By doing this Rockefeller established a monopoly over the entire oil industry.

The Rockefeller family ended up becoming so wealthy, they were able to finance the construction of all 14 buildings in Rockefeller Center. Rockefeller Center is a very important piece of American history. Rockefeller Center became a landmark for its importance in the number of jobs it created during the great depression and the impact it had on the nation’s morale. The Standard Oil Company flourished under the new growing demand for oil, not just nationally but globally. During the standard oil Company’s height it was privately selling to European and Asian countries at an even greater amount than the United States itself. The Company later absorbs a few other Oil companies into itself forming the Standard Oil Trust placing John D. Rockefeller in charge of the whole operation. While in charge of the trust Rockefeller created a centralized structure to manage it, this central structured investment had immense amounts of power over many points of the economy. In addition to the companies control over the economy it was highly privatized and was able to expand rapidly setting numerous supply lines and joining with railroad companies to piggyback off their vast networks allowing the Standard Oil Company to undersell all of its adversaries and cause many of them to either join them or file bankruptcy.

In conclusion John d Rockefeller was the greatest businessman to ever live. Without him creating jobs, bringing huge amounts of money into the United States economy, and setting a precedent for future entrepreneurs to follow our country would look very different today.

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