right now the populations of many nations have levels of trust in their governments that
are the lowest they've been in decades for example in the united kingdom the british
social attitude survey reported in october 2020 that only 15 percent of respondents believed that
they trusted their government most of the time or always less than half as many who said they
never trust the government in the united states to september 2021 paul put the numbers at roughly 39
with government trust at such low levels the idea of privatizing sectors of the government
may seem more appealing than it has for some time there are a lot of hunters out
there saying that the free market is the best guarantee of efficiency but maybe today's list
would be a counter-argument to that corporations can be as clumsy callus or even
as downright malicious as governments while the technology for whistleblowers
has reached potent heights in recent years it's by no means a recent phenomena
10. blackwater older viewers may remember how during the u.s invasions of iraq and
afghanistan mounting u.s body counts were lowering the popularity of conflicts that
were already acquiring a reputation for stretching off unbearably long and costing a horrific number
of lives because the deaths of mercenaries did not play as negatively in the press reliance on them
increased one of the most prominent beneficiaries of this was blackwater which in the wake of the
september 11 2001 attacks received more than a billion dollars in government contracts to
supply security services in afghanistan and iraq under ceo eric prince blackwater came roaring
into public consciousness in september 2007 when four soldiers opened fire on civilians in source
square baghdad and killed 14 while wounding an additional 18. while the mercenaries would
be found guilty one of murder threw of voluntary manslaughter all were pardoned in 2020 except the
one who testified against the others and there was considerable outcry from the military that would
have to deal with the insurgents inspired by the war crime it would not be the end of blackwater's
opportunity to commit war crimes though in 2010 four more contractors would be charged with the
murder of two afghan civilians in kabul firing into a civilian vehicle because it drove past
their own overturned vehicle in 2011 contractor justin cannon was found guilty and sentenced to
30 months in prison so what consequences would blackwater suffer well in 2010 the
company agreed to pay 42 million dollars in fines to the united states by the next year eric prince
would leave and the business would have such a tarnished reputation that it would change its name
all in all fleeting public humiliation sounds like a small cost compared with nearly a billion
dollars in contracts 9. enron founded in 1985 enron became a modest energy company in the 1990s
enron found more success by negotiating energy deals between natural gas suppliers and clients
it was said to negotiate as much as 2.5 billion dollars a day in large part a beneficiary of
newly emergent internet commerce the real trouble started in the early 2000s when competition made
its growth unsustainable projections of future profits began to become reported as regular income
while less profitable sectors of the company were moved to shell companies labeled special purpose
entities to help cover this brewing trouble while still claiming rapid growth the accounting firm
arthur anderson served as both consultant and auditor the charade became unstable in august 2001
when jeffrey skilling resigned as chief executive officer and founder kenneth lay was brought back
by october that year the company's record profits would abruptly change to a quarterly loss of 600
million dollars leading to an investigation that would see the company declare bankruptcy to the
tune of 74 billion including the pensions of many employees a large amount of which were lost
permanently in what might seem hard to believe in the wake of the recent great recession a number
of enron executives served significant prison sentences jeffrey skilling would serve 12 years
of a 24-year sentence for 18 counts of fraud chief financial officer andrew fasto who pled guilty
served six years kenneth lay did not live to see the ruling on his case number eight volkswagen
group while volkswagen claims it intends to be carbon neutral by 2050 to combat climate change
it's very difficult to take that claim seriously in the wake of findings that first went to court
in september 2015. in what may seem like one of the most high-tech forms of fraud ever committed
vw would be investigated for placing software in its diesel vehicles that monitored if they
were under test conditions and then adjusted the vehicle's performance to emit less carbon
for the duration of the test vw admitted that it sent 482 000 vehicles with the software to america
but overall it had sent 11 million worldwide while it's hardly unknown for corporate trials
to drag out for years even if the company admits to its wrong doings early in the proceedings
dieselgate is a suit that just seems to keep getting bigger in september 2021 four former
employees went to court for knowingly concealing the presence of the software as of december 2021
a 91 000 plaintiff lawsuit from the uk was ongoing against the company even if the latest trials
all go vw's way as of 2021 it will have already cost the company more than 37.7 billion dollars
in direct fees settlements etc it also gives the green energy movement bit of a black eye
7. peanut corporation of america in 2008 peanut paste from peanut corporation of america was to be
found in more than 4 000 products including cookie products from nabisco this would be something of
a problem for the nation as their product had one of the largest and most dangerous concentrations
of salmonella in food safety history in all seven deaths and 714 additional illnesses many involving
critical hospitalizations would result before the largest food recall in history took place
to the tune of over a billion dollars by 2015 stuart and michael parnell the brothers who served
as the company's chief executive and peanut broker would be sentenced to 28 and 20 years respectively
it was the first time the chief executive was convicted in a food safety lawsuit perhaps the
most significant change was that in 2011 president obama signed the food safety modernization act or
at least that might have been if the bill hadn't included clauses that delayed its implementation
date by several years allowing president trump to further delay its implementation in 2018.
to date the biden administration has not made any efforts to reverse the delay
6. bank of america you'll recall a reference from a few entries ago to the 2008 global
recession one of the largest perpetrators of the fraud that caused the recession which 30
of the u.s population still hadn't recovered from by 2017 as reported by u.s news was ruled to be
bank of america in august 2014 the us department of justice reported that bank of america
would pay the u.s government a settlement of 16.5 billion dollars for fortunately selling mislabeled
home loan securities in layman's terms they were selling portions of debt to investors based on
false reports of how likely the indebted were to be able to pay it back of that roughly 7 billion
was earmarked to be sent to the hundreds of thousands of consumers who could prove they were
impacted by the fraud that was the largest fine a single company has paid in u.s history to put
the severity of that punishment in perspective in 2021 bank of america reported 7.7 billion dollars
in third quarter profits alone so the largest amount any company has ever been directly fined
for its crimes cost it significantly less than a decent year's profits doesn't inspire
much confidence that the law is equipped to do much that will keep the financial firms in line
does it number 5. dupont the petrochemical giant dupont has been connected to nightmarishly shady
dealing since the 1930s perhaps the most shameful aspect of its history is that it was one of 150
major american corporations whose dealing with the third reich facilitated the war economy that would
plunge europe into world war ii dupont was unique in that nazi germany declaring war in america in
december 1941 did not put an end to those business dealings the company continued its business with
america's enemy until september 1943 and it only ended because the reich seized all dupont assets
in reich territory when you're in a relationship with a nazi and they're the one that breaks it
you know you've got problems in february 2009 dupont became associated with a breathtakingly
heinous crime duponte robert richards pled guilty to sexually assaulting his daughter when she was 3
years old the judge gave him 8 years probation a fine of under 6 500 and it would even be alleged
that he didn't pay that in 2014 his ex-wife sued him for damages that the case had caused and it
became the new sensation it somehow avoided being for five years beyond dupont another prominent
name was pulled into the fray when it turned out attorney general beau biden the late son of
president joe biden was the prosecutor who allowed that extremely light sentence 4. united fruit
the early 20th century is replete with stories of labor and management conflicts that escalated to
violence sometimes with the loss of life almost certainly the single deadliest incident from this
period was when 25 000 employees of the united fruit company in bogota colombia went on strike
in december 1928. they had nine demands including that they work six to eight weeks and that they be
paid in cash instead of company script united fruit responded by reporting that the workers
were turning communist which meant the u.s marines would have to invade colombia to
preserve national sovereignty colombian police and armed forces opened fire on the striking workers
on the first night they left nine bodies on the ground in reference to the nine demands accounts
for just how many people were paid to keep united fruit from having to pay wages vary it's quite
revealing that u.s ambassador jefferson caffrey hardly a communist propagandist sent a message to
the state department claiming that over a thousand strikers have been killed united fruit later
changing its name to chiquita banana apparently decided the blood money was worth it and turned to
violence again decades later in 2007 the company pled guilty to funding right-wing terrorists and
cocaine dealers known as the united self-defense forces of colombia the fine for all the death and
mayhem that they financed that second time came to 25 million dollars number three theranose
few frauds have attracted as many high-profile marks as elizabeth holmes by 2014 henry kissinger
and former defense secretary james warrior monk mattis had been board members for a company
theranos her investors included the walton family particularly through walgreens and rupert murdoch
the clinton foundation hosted her during a panel when her company was valued at nine
billion dollars when she was only 31. there was one problem the company's main product
an innovative form of blood test didn't detect cancer diabetes or any of the other diseases it
was reputed to with any reliability the failure meant that by 2018 the company was dissolved
by january 2022 she was found guilty of four counts of defrauding investors the fact she was
not found guilty of using her company to defraud patients was presumably cold comfort especially as
she had embarrassed many rich and powerful enemies number two chevron in the 1960s the oil company
texaco signed a contract to develop land in ecuador around the lago agrio region for drilling
in their wake they left behind 1 700 acres of land polluted with by-products that the locals would
allege in a lawsuit raised leukemia and cancer rates significantly employing the services of
human rights lawyer stephen donzinger in 2011 they won the suit and chevron the company which
had acquired texaco was ordered to pay 9.5 billion dollars the first time an indigenous population
won such a lawsuit against an old corporation instead of paying chevron seemed determined to
go after donsinger personally even after three epoch courts confirmed the verdict judge louis
kaplan overturned the verdict and under strategic lawsuits by chevron ordered donzinger to turn over
decades of records protected by attorney-client privilege when donsinger refused to do so he was
put under house arrest for an unprecedented two years while kaplan hand-picked a judge to handle
his contempt of court charges against donzinger meanwhile a judge that the prosecution had called
as a witness admitted that he had lied in his testimony against donsinger eventually donzinger
was found guilty and sentenced to an additional six months in prison though part way through that
sentence it was commuted to house arrest by the way the judge lewis kaplan who presided over the
corruption he was appointed by president clinton some forms of judicial abuse apparently transcend
party politics 1. dying corp years before blackwater even existed dyncorp was proving
just what atrocities military contractors are capable of in 1999 dyncorp employees ben johnson
catherine balkavats were working in bosnia the former is a helicopter mechanic and the latter
as a police officer for the united nations while they were there they witnessed women obviously
underage being trafficked around in johnson's case he reported seeing dying corp employees
at camp comanche near the city of tusler actively partaking in the crime by 2012
13 dyncorp employees would be send time for hiring child prostitutes or trafficking them though none
faced criminal prosecution both johnson and bulkavats were fired shortly after making their
reports and both would win wrongful termination lawsuits by now you're probably not expecting
dyncorp to have faced severe consequences for this which would be correct the u.s government
didn't just continue to contract dyncorp services in 2014 it was reported by the daily beast that
over the course of america's disastrous invasion of afghanistan 69 went to dyncorp for example
2.5 to 4 billion dollars earmarked for afghan reconstruction went to the company in 2008 stephen
feinberg the company owner was appointed to chair an executive board reviewing information from
foreign intelligence agencies as embarrassing as president biden's withdrawal from afghanistan was
it seems to have been the closest dyncorp has suffered to punishment
you