robber barons

Cultural  

1. A term applied to certain leading American businessmen of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including Cornelius Vanderbilt and John D. Rockefeller. The term suggests that they acquired their wealth by means more often foul than fair.

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Example Sentences

Even before the pandemic, the United States was seeing a level of wealth inequality and concentration not seen since the Gilded Age of the Robber Barons.

From Salon

A grand ballroom promises the kind of extravagance not seen since those robber barons’ heyday.

From National Geographic

Like Mrs. Parish, who freshened up the Kennedy White House, and Mr. Hampton, who elevated the habitats of 1980s-era robber barons, Ms. Rheinstein brought an American freshness to English country style.

From New York Times

Sharlet imagines a reader stumbling onto his book decades from now in the kind of used bookstore he likes to frequent — where he recently found, for instance, Matthew Josephson’s 1934 history, “The Robber Barons.”

From Los Angeles Times

But all that it actually does is allow robber barons to swoop in and steal everything while leaving ordinary working people holding an empty bag.

From Salon