History Main / ThereAreNoGoodExecutives

** Maxwell Lord, the CEO and founder of ''Comicbook/JusticeLeagueInternational'', used to be a decent guy, albeit arrogant, but he's been retconned into a villain for no apparent reason.

* In ''Literature/Island1962'', if you own, manage, work for or support an oil company, you are an evil, greedy person out to destroy [[{{Utopia}} Palan way of life]].

* ThePhantomOfTheOpera: In the original book by Gaston Leroux, this is the reason Erik (the eponymous phantom) could maintain his reign of terror: In Parisian society, [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections it’s not what you do, it’s who you know]]. Therefore the executives at the Opera and the police are not only corrupt, but {{Stupid Boss}}es who don’t care about how to do their job better but only how to practice politics and be discreet about all their problems, making them the perfect victims of BlackMail.

* Subverted to a great extent in the [[FanFic/UltimateSleepwalker Earth]]-[[FanFic/UltimateSpiderWoman 2706]] verse. In both the ''Ultimate Sleepwalker'' and ''Ultimate Spider-Woman'' series, {{Corrupt Corporate Executive}}s have expressed their hatred of their honest competitors. According to corrupt executives like Norman Osborn, the Honest Corporate Executives (people like [[IronMan Tony Stark]], [[ComicBook/CaptainBritain Brian Braddock]], [[ComicBook/{{X-Men}} Warren Worthington]] and [[Comicbook/MoonKnight Marc Spector]]) are cowards who are holding the rest of them back. Guys like Stark and Worthington obviously enjoy the wealth and power that comes with their work, but at the end of the day they're really only interested in running their businesses. People like Osborn and Justin Hammer, on the other hand, actively believe that their wealth and power give them the right to lord over the lower classes and do whatever they want to them.

* ''Film/TronLegacy'' had an infamous scene with the Encom boardroom, where they're boasting about their latest and greatest operating system. The only subversion in the room points out that they're charging schools and non-profits a fortune - what are the customers getting in return? The idiot CEO shrugs and says "it has a 12 on the box..." This is meant to demonstrate that the company has fallen from its innovative times under Walter Gibbs and Flynn Sr. while cementing sympathy for Sam's [[PlayfulHacker annual]] [[LikeFatherLikeSon practical joke]].

For puppy-kicking baby-eating sociopaths who openly flout the law in an otherwise perfectly nice and functional society, this trope can overlap with YouFailEconomicsForever.

* Subverted to a great extent in the [[FanFic/UltimateSleepwalker Earth]]-[[FanFic/UltimateSpiderWoman 2706]] verse. In both the ''Ultimate Sleepwalker'' and ''Ultimate Spider-Woman'' series, {{Corrupt Corporate Executive}}s have expressed their hatred of their honest competitors. According to corrupt executives like Norman Osborn, the Honest Corporate Executives (people like [[IronMan Tony Stark]], [[ComicBook/CaptainBritain Brian Braddock]], [[ComicBook/{{X-Men}} Warren Worthington]] and [[Comicbook/MoonKnight Marc Spector]]) are cowards who hare holding the rest of them back. Guys like Stark and Worthington obviously enjoy the wealth and power that comes with their work, but at the end of the day they're really only interested in running their businesses. People like Osborn and Justin Hammer, on the other hand, actively believe that their wealth and power give them the right to lord over the lower classes and do whatever they want to them.

* ''Literature/TheGoneAwayWorld'': It doesn't help that all the executives in question are actually [[spoiler:ninjas]].

* Over at [[MarvelComics Marvel]], ComicBook/NormanOsborn, aka [[SuperpoweredEvilSide the Green Goblin]], is the poster child for this trope, along with many of IronMan's enemies, like Justin Hammer and Obadiah Stane.

* ''{{VideoGame/Syndicate}}''. There ''may'' have been aversions during the corporations' initial rise to power over the governments, but after [[TheSyndicate the syndicates]] took over the corporations using such ''[[SarcasmMode upstanding]]'' methods as bribery and murder..

* In TheDCU, everyone except [[Franchise/{{Batman}} Bruce Wayne]], and his CEO Lucius Fox, is villainous, from Lex Luthor to Morgan Edge, especially now that Ted Kord is dead.

...it can sometimes be ''bad'' for a company to engage in criminal activity - or even too much ''law-abiding'' chicanery and ruthlessness. Indeed, on several occasions perfectly legal exploitation and brutality has resulted in government intervention (as in [[TheGuildedAge the USA's 'Gilded Age']] to stave off [[RedScare 'The Red Hydra']]).

...it can sometimes be ''bad'' for a company to engage in criminal activity - or even too much ''law-abiding'' chicanery and ruthlessness. Indeed, on several occasions perfectly legal exploitation and brutality has resulted in government intervention (as in the USA's 'Gilded Age' to stave off 'The Red Hydra').

...it can be ''bad idea'' for a company to engage in criminal activity - or even too much ''legal'' chicanery and ruthlessness. Indeed, on several occasions perfectly legal exploitation and brutality has resulted in government intervention (as in the USA's 'Gilded Age' to stave off 'The Red Hydra').

This trope is incredibly common in {{Cyberpunk}} works.

To a certain extent this is TruthInTelevision. While pride, greed, and amorality are InherentInTheSystem this does not ''always'' translate into sadism, violence, and crime. It is not, for instance, illegal to lie about the contents of a food product in the USA (as this constitutes 'freedom of speech').

Moreover when a company is not:

...it ''can'' be bad for business for a company to engage in criminal activity or even ''legal'' chicanery and ruthlessness. Indeed, on several occasions perfectly legal exploitation and brutality has resulted in government intervention (as in the USA's 'Gilded Age').

In this setting, ''all'' businessmen are some variation of the CorruptCorporateExecutive. To them, swindling customers, abusing employees, or even resorting to violence to eliminate threats to their wealth and power simply comes with the job. Either that, or it's a nice fringe benefit. Don't expect to find any {{Honest Corporate Executive}}s. Even if you think you've found one, they'll turn out to be a VillainWithGoodPublicity.

This trope ''can'' be TruthInTelevision, but just as likely not. While ''some'' businessmen are evil, deceptive, and depraved, it is extreme hyperbole to consider ''all'' of them to be so. Indeed, it is quite reasonable to argue that [[EvilWillFail evil conduct is (in the long run) bad for a business]]; would ''you'' want to do business with a baby-eating puppy-kicking psychopath?

At times, this trope overlaps with YouFailEconomicsForever.

You may note that millionaire entrepreneurs do not always fall into this trope. These people are often depicted as independently wealthy [[SelfMadeMan Self Made Men]] who have wits and spirit enough to carve out their empires, and if not, they at least are in charge and take responsibility of them, tied to them in a way a king may be to his realm. Corporate executives, on the other hand, climb in an already established hierarchy, the leadership (thus also responsibility for any wrongdoing) of which is decentralised into some shadowy group, like "the board of directors"; going back to our feudal analogy, they would have more in common with [[EvilChancellor court intriguers]].

In this setting, ''all'' businessmen are some variation of the CorruptCorporateExecutive. To them, swindling customers, abusing employees or even resorting to violence to eliminate threats to their wealth and power simply comes with the job. Either that or it's a nice fringe benefit. Don't expect to find any {{Honest Corporate Executive}}s. Even if you think you've found one, they'll turn out to be a VillainWithGoodPublicity.

* Over at [[MarvelComics Marvel]], ComicBook/NormanOsborn, aka [[SuperpoweredEvilSide the Green Goblin]] is the poster child for this trope, along with many of IronMan's enemies, like Justin Hammer and Obadiah Stane.

[[AC: {{Film}}]]
* J.K. Robertson in the movie ''Film/TimeChasers'' was not at all deterred from proceeding on the Time Transport project, even after its inventor returned from a second visit to the future to reveal that the future had changed to one of anarchy as a result of the Time Transport being used as a weapon. In fact, he has the inventor and his love interest arrested, and later pursues them into the past, killing the love interest and murdering his own reluctant companion.
* Without exception, every single person on the corporate side of UBS in ''Film/{{Network}}'' is an amoral, money-grubbing monster. The film ends with [[spoiler:the main character being shot by a hitman hired by UBS, the voiceover stating that he was killed [[ScrewedByTheNetwork due to his show's failing ratings]]]].
* ''Film/TronLegacy'' had an infamous scene with the Encom boardroom, where they're boasting about their latest and greatest operating system. The only subversion in the room points out that they're charging schools and non-profits a fortune - what are the customers getting in return? The idiot CEO shrugs and says "it has a 12 on the box..." This is meant to demonstrate that the company has fallen from its innovative times under Walter Gibbs and Flynn Sr. while cementing sympathy for Sam's [[PlayfulHacker annual]] [[LikeFatherLikeSon practical joke]].
* Pretty much every executive at Clamp Enterprises in ''Film/Gremlins2TheNewBatch'' is a complete amoral a-hole except, ironically, the C.E.O. Daniel Clamp who's aloof but otherwise a nice guy. He does do one really douchy thing near the end, but it's to Forster [[KickTheSonOfABitch who's a jerk anyways.]]

*** Oliver Queen now has an investment firm, but it's really only used to justify the sheer number of arrows he goes through (and the trick arrows, when the writer likes them).
*** Oliver Queen ''upheld'' this trope at least once, when he remade his fortune through "The Gun Run Stock Market Crash", wherein he profited from short-selling on several major defense contractors after first artificially boosting their share price via timed purchases and then undermining consumer confidence in them through carefully placed rumors. Apparently the writer was unaware that this kind of investment strategy is called 'pump and dump', and is hilariously illegal.

** ...Except for one chapter of ''Comicbook/TheLifeAndTimesOfScroogeMcDuck'', where he JumpedOffTheSlipperySlope because he got sick of being the aversion ("Why should ''I'' have to be the only honest man in this cockeyed world? ... Why can't I take shortcuts like everyone else? ... Who died and left ''me'' in charge of morals?!") Considering that it got him a buttload of guilt and a zombie pursuer for several decades, he quickly learned to accept it.
** Although it depends heavily on the quality of the writer, as some minor stories have him commit acts that would, under close (or not so close) scrutiny be considered theft, extortion and fraud. (Hint: Trying to claim a heritage for yourself when legally binding documents state that it belongs to your nephew is ''not legal''.) Usually a sign that the writer didn't do their research.
*** CharacterizationMarchesOn. Scrooge started out as a much more antagonistic character, and many of his early appearances presented him as completely ruthless and downright eager to screw his nephew over at times. He also used to be a foil to Junior Woodchucks, often carelessly polluting the environment and once actively trying to drive a species of bald eagle to extinction to justify an industrial operation in their nesting area.

** The most benevolent big business seen in ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' was Doublemeat Palace, and they were concealing something (albeit something relatively innocuous) from their customers.
** Also on ''Buffy'', the demise of the reptile demon Mokita led to bankruptcies and suicides among a few corporate executives as his magic failed them.

** And then there's ''Series/{{Firefly}}'' and the Blue Sun Corporation...
*** Interesting in that, due to the notoriously short run of ''Firefly'', we were given minimal info on Blue Sun, other than a small tidbit on the Commentary, and the fact that River didn't like them. But everyone ''knows'' [[ForegoneConclusion they weren't going to be nice people...]]

** There have been notable subversions - the president in "The Top Hat Job" seems to be a decent guy, and an executive is their ''client'' in "The Lonely Hearts Job".
*** In fact, Nate believes this trope whole-heartedly, and has problems wrapping his head around the subversions.

* ''Comicstrip/{{Dilbert}}'', of course, although its viewpoint might be better described [[HumansAreBastards There Are No Good People]].
** One of the strip reprint books was titled ''I'm Not Anti-Business, I'm Anti-Idiot''.

** To be fair on the first score, he thought knowing about the future would enable him to prevent it (surely anarchy isn't good for business after all), which makes sense because the future had changed once already in the film.
*** Waitaminute, is this ''Time Chasers'' as in the ''[=MST3K=]'' film? Because if so ... well, that kind of explains any and every characterization fuckup fairly instantly...

** Even most of the [[BombThrowingAnarchists Marxist terrorist gang]] are greedy capitalists! One of the main executives gives a speech about how Communist nations are run the same as large American corporations.

* J.K. Robertson in the movie ''TimeChasers'' was not at all deterred from proceeding on the Time Transport project, even after its inventor returned from a second visit to the future to reveal that the future had changed to one of anarchy as a result of the Time Transport being used as a weapon. In fact, he has the inventor and his love interest arrested, and later pursues them into the past, killing the love interest and murdering his own reluctant companion.

* Without exception, every single person on the corporate side of UBS in ''{{Network}}'' is an amoral, money-grubbing monster. The film ends with [[spoiler:the main character being shot by a hitman hired by UBS, the voiceover stating that he was killed [[ScrewedByTheNetwork due to his show's failing ratings]]]].

** Before the ComicBook/{{Crisis|on Infinite Earths}}, Morgan Edge was [[JerkWithAHeartOfGold arrogant and obnoxious, but certainly not evil]], and he could even show a surprisingly decent side from time to time (refusing to cross a union's picket line, for instance). An [[EvilTwin evil clone]] once tried to frame him as being a minion of {{ComicBook/Darkseid}}, but Edge was proven innocent. PostCrisis, the affiliation with Darkseid was declared ''real,'' and he is now really and truly evil.

* Over at [[MarvelComics Marvel]], NormanOsborn, aka [[SuperpoweredEvilSide the Green Goblin]] is the poster child for this trope, along with many of IronMan's enemies, like Justin Hammer and Obadiah Stane.

** [[GreenArrow Oliver Queen]] was also a subversion, but has gotten out of the game.

You may note that millionaire entrepreneurs [[UnclePennybags do not always]] fall into this trope. These people are often depicted as independently wealthy [[SelfMadeMan Self Made Men]] who have wits and spirit enough to carve out their empires, and if not, they at least are in charge and take responsibility of them, tied to them in a way a king may be to his realm. Corporate executives, on the other hand, climb in an already established hierarchy, the leadership (thus also responsibility for any wrongdoing) of which is decentralised into some shadowy group, like "the board of directors"; going back to our feudal analogy, they would have more in common with [[EvilChancellor court intriguers]].

** Before the ComicBook/{{Crisis|on Infinite Earths}}, Morgan Edge was [[JerkWithAHeartOfGold arrogant and obnoxious, but certainly not evil]], and he could even show a surprisingly decent side from time to time (refusing to cross a union's picket line, for instance). An [[EvilTwin evil clone]] once tried to frame him as being a minion of {{Darkseid}}, but Edge was proven innocent. PostCrisis, the affiliation with Darkseid was declared ''real,'' and he is now really and truly evil.

** [[PreCrisis Before the Crisis,]] Morgan Edge was [[JerkWithAHeartOfGold arrogant and obnoxious, but certainly not evil]], and he could even show a surprisingly decent side from time to time (refusing to cross a union's picket line, for instance). An [[EvilTwin evil clone]] once tried to frame him as being a minion of {{Darkseid}}, but Edge was proven innocent. PostCrisis, the affiliation with Darkseid was declared ''real,'' and he is now really and truly evil.

*** Oliver Queen ''upheld'' this trope at least once, when he remade his fortune through "The Gun Run Stock Market Crash", wherein he profited from short-selling on several major defense contractors after first artificially boosting their share price via timed purhcases and then undermining consumer confidence in them through carefully placed rumors. Apparently the writer was unaware that this kind of investment strategy is called 'pump and dump', and is hilariously illegal.

This trope is incredibly common in {{Cyberpunk}} works. Ironic, considering that Cyberpunk MegaCorp entities were based on the bureaucratic monoliths of 1950's America and the Zaibatsu Corporations (i.e. "preferred merchants") of Japan, which were anything but free market entities.