4 ms·

Honest question, were there robber barons besides the famous ones in the US?

danielvf 11y ago
Oh yes. The term came from the late Middle Ages when some people with a castle and soldiers were essentially thieves with open power and quasi legal cover. Their primary income was what they took, not taxes from lands they ruled. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron The Rhine river hills are covered with the castles of robber barons who took protection money from ships. I had ancestors who lived in Central Europe who lived near enough to a robber baron. From time to time, the baron's men would ride out from their castle and steal everything they could carry from neighboring villages.
- thaumasiotes 11y ago
  > Their primary income was what they took, not taxes from lands they ruled. > The Rhine river hills are covered with the castles of robber barons who took protection money from ships. How exactly does this differ from "taxing"?
  - taejo 11y ago
    Because they took money from merchant ships instead of peasants, where barons are supposed to get their taxes :/ (Actually, shipping tolls on the Rhine were supposed to be set according to guidelines set by the Holy Roman Emperor; the robber barons violated these guidelines)
  - danielvf 11y ago
    In both cases there was no rulership going on, and in both cases the robbery being done was in areas not under the robbers baron's de-jure authority.
    - thaumasiotes 11y ago
      When you build your own castle and set up toll stations on roads and rivers, there is rulership going on. You're it! The wikipedia article suggests that the robber barons weren't difficult to stamp out, because they lived openly in giant castles. They existed because there wasn't a government above them to squash them. Filling a power vacuum doesn't make you a bandit, it makes you a warlord.
  - oxide 11y ago
    taking something called "protection money" sounds like extortion to me, but now we're splitting hairs.
  - TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
    You get something back from taxes - things like health care (in Europe at least), infrastructure, R&D investment, education, and so on. Political systems that don't have proper checks and balances always devolve to caste banditry - which is not quite the same thing as getting something useful for your money.
    - thaumasiotes 11y ago
      This does not reflect any understanding of taxes before, say, the 19th or 20th century. Hammurabi certainly didn't devote his funds to public health care or public education. Infrastructure, yes. R&D... probably not. Monuments, public religion, and the military would have figured in his budget. What you get back from taxes is stability. If robber barons kept ships from being attacked (other than by themselves) along their stretch of the river, they were fulfilling the necessary function of a taxing agent.
leoc 11y ago
Yes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron . They probably built dozens of medieval European buildings...
pavlov 11y ago
A hundred years ago there were rubber barons in Brazil: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_rubber_boom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_rubber_boom

Oh yes. The term came from the late Middle Ages when some people with a castle and soldiers were essentially thieves with open power and quasi legal cover. Their primary income was what they took, not taxes from lands they ruled. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron The Rhine river hills are covered with the castles of robber barons who took protection money from ships. I had ancestors who lived in Central Europe who lived near enough to a robber baron. From time to time, the baron's men would ride out from their castle and steal everything they could carry from neighboring villages.

thaumasiotes 11y ago
> Their primary income was what they took, not taxes from lands they ruled. > The Rhine river hills are covered with the castles of robber barons who took protection money from ships. How exactly does this differ from "taxing"?
- taejo 11y ago
  Because they took money from merchant ships instead of peasants, where barons are supposed to get their taxes :/ (Actually, shipping tolls on the Rhine were supposed to be set according to guidelines set by the Holy Roman Emperor; the robber barons violated these guidelines)
- danielvf 11y ago
  In both cases there was no rulership going on, and in both cases the robbery being done was in areas not under the robbers baron's de-jure authority.
  - thaumasiotes 11y ago
    When you build your own castle and set up toll stations on roads and rivers, there is rulership going on. You're it! The wikipedia article suggests that the robber barons weren't difficult to stamp out, because they lived openly in giant castles. They existed because there wasn't a government above them to squash them. Filling a power vacuum doesn't make you a bandit, it makes you a warlord.
- oxide 11y ago
  taking something called "protection money" sounds like extortion to me, but now we're splitting hairs.
- TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
  You get something back from taxes - things like health care (in Europe at least), infrastructure, R&D investment, education, and so on. Political systems that don't have proper checks and balances always devolve to caste banditry - which is not quite the same thing as getting something useful for your money.
  - thaumasiotes 11y ago
    This does not reflect any understanding of taxes before, say, the 19th or 20th century. Hammurabi certainly didn't devote his funds to public health care or public education. Infrastructure, yes. R&D... probably not. Monuments, public religion, and the military would have figured in his budget. What you get back from taxes is stability. If robber barons kept ships from being attacked (other than by themselves) along their stretch of the river, they were fulfilling the necessary function of a taxing agent.

leoc 11y ago

Yes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron . They probably built dozens of medieval European buildings...

pavlov 11y ago

A hundred years ago there were rubber barons in Brazil: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_rubber_boom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_rubber_boom