Fur_Company

Yes. The American Fur company does hint to how and why capitalism has changed over the years. Firstly there was a change in terms (1)The American Fur Company was the first company to become a trust which allowed Astor to consolidate many different fur trading companies into one large monolpy.The tolerance of monopolies at that point in time was far more allowed as compared to the present and allowed for the Fur company to overprice their products. In many jurisdictions many competition laws restrict monopolies, sometimes governments decide legally whether a given company is a monopoly that doesn't serve the best interests of the market and/or consumers. Governments may force such companies to divide into smaller independent corporations as was the case of AT&T, or alter its behaviour as was the case of Microsoft, to protect consumers. (2) Secondly as can be seen in the case the workers of the American Fur company were often exploited, mountain men or trappers were often treated unfairly by Astor Company. Trappers employed by the company had to work unlimited hours in hazardous conditions while Astor made little efforts to ensure the safety of them. In addition he cut their wages and forced them to buy his market-up goods, which eventually led to them becoming indebted to him. However, presently there are many labour laws which surround the work force to ensure they are fairly treated; these laws were developed as a means to prevent large companies such as American Fur Company from taking advantage of its workers Thirdly The American fur company also took advantage of the natural resources. The government at this time did not exhort any sort of policies for well being of the environment and its natural resources and lead to a great depletion of such resources. How ever today the government has become stricter and places a lot of emphasis on ensuring that large companies operate in a manner that is environmentally friendly rather than allowing them to obtain profits at the expense of the environment.