H2 Flashcards
Trust:
a mechanism by which one company grants control over its operations, through ownership of its stock, to another company. The standard oil company became known for this practice in the 1870s as it eliminated its competition by taking control of smaller oil companies.
Syndicate:
an association of financiers organized to carry out projects requiring very large amounts of capital
Patrician:
characterized by noble or high social standing
Social Darwinist:
believer in the idea, popular in the late nineteenth century, that people gained wealth by “survival of the fittest.” Therefore, the wealthy had simply won a natural competition and owed nothing to the poor, and indeed service to the poor would interfere with this organic process
Socialists:
those who hold the political belief in promoting social and economic equality through the ownership and control of the major means of production by the whole community rather than by individuals or corporations
Lockout:
the refusal by an employer to allow employees to work unless they agree to his or her terms
Anarchists:
those who hold the political belief that all organized, coercive government is wrong in principle and that society should be organized solely on the basis of free cooperation, some practiced violence against state while others were nonviolent pacifists
Thomas Alva Edison:
most versatile inventor, was a gifted tinkerer and tireless worker, not a pure scientist
Andrew Carnegie:
known as the steel King, forged ahead by working hard, doing extra chores, assuming responsibility, and cultivating influential people
John D. Rockefeller:
the oil baron, became a successful businessman at age 19 and organized the standard oil company of Ohio, nucleus of the great trust formed in 1882
Samuel Gompers:
pressed into overtime service because of his strong voice. Elected president of the American federation of labor every year except one from 1886 to 1924. Took down to earth approach to engineer sweeping social reform and shunned politics for economic strategies and goals.
Free enterprise:
an economic system that permits unrestricted entrepreneurial business activity; capitalism
