The U.S. corporation is a modern leviathan that has greater impact upon the lives and fortunes of Americans than any other force outside Government. The 500 largest U.S. corporations embrace nearly two-thirds of all nonagricultural economic activity, employ one in every seven U.S. workers, wield massive economic power over the whole U.S. economy. How are corporations using that power? What problems has it created?
In The Corporation in Modern Society (Harvard University Press; $6.75), 14 topflight economists, lawyers and political scientists take a searching and comprehensive look at the corporate giant. A....