[wallawe]

What is the answer to 99 out of 100 questions? Money.

It is not the pubicly-held companies. It is the power of money to control, persuade, influence, or even empower.

This is not necessarily a bad thing. It is true that money doesn't buy happiness but even truer that not having money can cause unhappiness via stress among other things.

The problem is what people who have money decide to do with it and how they choose to influence the larger whole. Many of the people who have put their entire intellect towards making money, have desired to do so for the wrong reasons and therefore use it in a net negative way as you have put it.

I guess what I am saying, is that it falls on the individual to make the right decision, and not corporations, governments or societies as a whole.