Out of morbid curiosity, I wanted to compare what successful companies actively helped the Nazis and are still successful today.
There were quite a few companies I found. Some of them were shut down when they lost the war, but many still remain extremely profitable today. I wonder how much of that is in part because of their role?
Nestle
Everyone has heard of Nestle’s immoral take on taking and selling public water for a profit to the communities. It is no wonder they had no issue participating with the Nazis.
Standard Oil
They have the same issue.
All the car companies!
Audi, BMW, Ford, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Volkswagen
To be fair Germany was the center of car production at the time and still has a lot of that expertise for luxury cars. The one exception to this is Ford who was notoriously an HUGE anti-semite, even Hitler himself said he was an inspiration. Either way, I’m all for Tesla coming up and taking all these companies futures.
Banks – Barclays, Chase, Deutsche Bank
Banks also have an issue being on the wrong side of history and engaging in criminal activity for profit. Unfortunately, every other major bank has the same problems. This doesn’t seem unique to them.
Bayer – A medical giant.
These medical companies buy up patents and over charge life savings medicine. Bayer even invented Aspirin. Good thing I’m a Tylenol man.
At this point I realized not all the companies had a history of being immoral. In fact, it just seems to be all the internationally operating companies at the time had no issue.
The Associated Press, Siemens, Hugo Boss, General Motors, IBM, Swarovski, Coca-cola.
These are big names that even today have huge amounts of goodwill. Everyone loves cola. My own mom collects Swarovski crystals. Siemens produces reliable tools. Many consider the Associated Press to have one of the most neutral news platforms.
These weren’t just companies seeking extra profits at the time though. They weren’t simply selling their services to the Nazis. These companies were engaged in forced slave labour. These companies were reporting information about all their Jewish employees.
I am not attempting to boycott all these companies, but it does make me wonder if history will repeat itself.
It gets even more complicated if you look at who got rich during that time and own the popular brands of today. Pret a Manger, Dr Pepper, and Krispy Kreme all currently have majority ownership from what was originally Nazi money.
Sadly, money is money, no matter where it came from. There is a movement towards transparency but I suspect most people do not care.
Which companies in 100 years will be judged by their complicit actions in the Middle east or China?