Capitalism's only existed for 500 years or so.
In that time, some businesses have shaped human society more than others, whether by subjugating continents and controlling commodities or giving us microwaves and cheeseburgers.
Here are a few of the ones that have shaped our modern world.
1600: The British East India Company ruled much of the globe.
At one point in history, the British East India company accounted for half the world's trade, mostly through dominating the spice trade.
Other items on the state-sanctioned company's resume: It began the British domination of India and started the Opium Wars in China.
The results were truly historic, Asia Times reports:
In 1700, India and China accounted for 47% of world gross domestic product while Western Europe's share was a mere 26%. By 1870, the Asian giants slumped to a combined 29% of world GDP and Western Europe leaped to 42%. The East India Company was the primary device for this reversal of world scales.
The British East India Company also helped shape the U.S. The British Parliament signed the Tea Act in 1773 to get rid of the millions of pounds of tea that the East India Company had stored in its warehouses by selling it to the American colonies, where they had a monopoly on tea.
Vexed by the taxation without representation, the colonies promptly held a Boston Tea Party.
You know the rest.
1853: The Otis Elevator Company made the modern city possible.
In 2008, for the first time in human history, the majority of people lived in cities.
If cities are to grow denser — that is, taller — they need elevators.
The company that made elevators friendly is called Otis, founded by the American industrialist Elisha Otis.
"Before Otis' invention, buildings rarely reached seven stories (elevators were considered just too dangerous to implement),"ArchDaily writes."But it was Otis' elevator that would allow for the creation, and proliferation of, the skyscraper — an explosion that would for ever alter the 20th and 21st century skylines."
Thanks to Otis, our biggest cities are stuffed with skyscrapers:
• Hong Kong has 1,268
• New York has 595
• Tokyo has 411
• Chicago has 293
• Dubai has 249
Bonus fact: The world's tallest building, the 2,722-foot-tall Burj Khalifa in Dubai, runs Otis elevators.
1870: Standard Oil controlled the world's most precious resource.
John D. Rockefeller cofounded Standard Oil in 1870. He'd become the richest American in history, with an estimated net worth of $440 billion.
The money came from leading a monopoly of the most valuable commodity in the world. By the 1880s, Standard Oil controlled the refining, distributing, and the rest of the oil industry.
On May 15, 1911, the Supreme Court broke up Standard Oil, on the grounds that the mega-corporation violated the Sherman Antitrust Act. The result was 34 separate companies, with descendants including ExxonMobil, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips.
That breakup is a big part of the history of journalism, since it was hastened by muckraker Ida Tarbell's mammoth "The History of the Standard Oil Company."
See the rest of the story at Business Insider