ABSTRACT
Sociologist C. Wright Mills used the term higher immorality to describe a moral insensitivity among the most wealthy and powerful members of the US corporate, political, and military elite, which he termed the power elite. For Mills, the higher immorality translated into a variety of unethical, corrupt, and sometimes illegal practices, which were viewed as a systematic, institutionalized feature of contemporary US society. This chapter concerns executive salaries and expense accounts, laws relating to the incomes of corporate executives and corporations, the creation of phony crises by the power elite, and violations of antitrust laws. It explores one form of the higher immorality only hinted at in Mills's provocative analysis: the relationships between the wealthy and powerful and members of organized crime. The chapter begins with a microcosm of the higher immorality, the massive inequality of wealth, income, and power. It discusses a series of acts that involve the exercise of elite power.
