I had to write this article before the inspiration left me. Again, this is purely spontaneous and I always reserve the right to change my views and opinions at any time upon the receipt of new information. This is only a 'thought experiment' to explore a world that I hardly understand.
They say that all good business is "Win-Win". A good 'Deal' in business is when everyone feels they have gotten what they wanted out of a certain transaction and don't feel like they were taken advantage of in that transaction.
This is true only to a certain extent. There is a grey area between a "Good Deal" and "Corruption." The line exists but it is a line that is vague and elusive.
This topic came to me through the now famous case of New York vs the Trump Organization of unlawful practices in evaluating their properties to get favorable outcomes with certain institutions such as banks and insurance companies as well as on taxes.
It occurred to me that I haven't heard any discussion as to why the organizations affected weren't implicated in the cases as well. Maybe they were, I don't spend a whole lot of time following these stories because there is only so much of Trump I can take in a day.
I researched if banks or bank officers are rewarded for getting loans done for people and businesses. For a bank, the bank earns a lot of money on interest from loans, so it is profitable for the business. What about the officers executing the loans,, do they get rewarded? Some of the resources I checked said they did.
Hypothetically speaking, would it be too far afield to suggest that either through some sort of commission that bank officers earn from making loans or an insurance brokerage/agent from selling insurance? The more the property is evaluated to be worth, the larger the loan, the larger the commission, or the larger the coverage.
Let's say you have a property that is 100 square feet the current market value is 1 million dollars and the owner needs a $1.1 million loan. If you evaluated the property to be 150 square feet then that would mean that the property is now worth $1.5 million Making it possible to lend based on $1.5 million instead of $1.0 million. The loan is made and the owner gets their money, the bank gets their money, and then the loan is paid off in due course. No harm no foul, right?
Wrong!
Corruption is a quid pro quo game. If you give me that you will get this in return. If you allow me to value my property at $500,000 more than it is worth and give me the loan for $100,000 more than the property is actually worth, you will get the commission for the loan/insurance policy and the bank will earn a lot of interest and fees from the transaction. At the very worst would be if there were 'kickback' payments to bank/insurance officers to motivate them to do the deal.
As long as everything gets paid for it is still an illegal and criminal activity because that is the very definition of corruption. When it happens in government it is even worse.
When you look at the Trump business history you are seeing two types of deals. One is where the other party just gets screwed because they have no other option. Secondly, you have Trump asking for rules and laws to be ignored so he can get the deals he wants. The old, "I'll build a hotel here if you let me off from following environmental/development ordinances fees involved." All of these are not necessarily 'illegal', but they are ethically, and morally wrong because not everyone has the same ability or criminal mind to do such things."
In honest business dealings a $1= a $1. When multiple parties collude to create scenarios that are divergent from the facts and bloated numbers are created to affect the benefit of those involved, then that is corruption and it is not only immoral but also illegal. In the case of Trump, I'd venture to guess that much of his business operated this way in some fashion over the years. But, it isn't for me to say.
The question must be asked, "Who all benefitted from this if nobody lost because of it?" I'm guessing several.