[jdsully]

I don't fully agree with the linked thesis, but it was a convenient link to show the average picture and his affect on consumers. Rockefeller absolutely participated in predatory pricing within local markets. Of course if you only look at national average data you won't see this.

Rockefeller would likely have still won even in a fair fight just because of his economy of scale. But that wasn't enough for him, and he resorted to underhanded tactics like having his own subsidiaries engage in fake price wars between each other. The full ownership of those subsidiaries was intentionally obscured. In this day national average data may be sufficient to build a picture, but at that time national companies were very rare and competition was heavily regional. Note that this was only a net negative for his competitors, consumers benefited from the low prices and the predicted gouging never came after.

There is a common line of thought that because consumers weren't immediately harmed that Rockefeller should never have been tried. I don't agree with that logic - the end does not justify the means.