People Explain Which Industries Are More Corrupt Than Anyone Wants To Admit

As consumers, we all have some corporations that we support and others we do not, based on the brands we use and the topics we focus on. And we'll inevitably have some opinions about the corporations we don't support.

But there's a possibility that they might be much worse in nature than we even gave them credit for.

Curious, Redditor Mean_Development7655 asked:

"Which industry is more corrupt than anyone's ready to admit?"

Food Processing

"Agriculture and food processing."

"A lot of the worst big business practices and corporate influence on government started with the industrialization of food production."

- Beytran70

"Also, completely different from what people imagine."

"You’re not talking about some family living on their 40-acre farm going out every day to help their workers harvest their crop."

"You’re talking about an industrial machine run by massive corporations you have never heard the name of that own tens of thousands of acres spread out across three states. If there is a ‘family,’ they almost always live in urban areas or McMansions with no agricultural facilities around them."

- No-Drama-in-Paradise

Art Collecting

"Art dealers. Name another industry where you can buy something for $50mm anonymously and move it across borders."

- acecoffeeco

"Having worked in that industry, you are correct. Incredibly rich people obfuscating the value during import/export. shipping to a warehouse in the middle of nowhere, so they don't pay a fair tax rate on the works."

"Don't even get me started about inflating the value of a friend's work by buying at an inflated price so they can sell it to the next buyer for Millions."

- Bif_Mcgilicutty

Similarly, Music

"Music Industry. It’s designed to be 'fun and games' but take one look at contracts. The only industry where contracts are meant to be more confusing than clear."

- kbreezy200

"The music industry is completely hopeless. It's all producers pushing artists towards expected trends. New artists never have a chance to unfold their own style before they're told what to do by the established marketing folks, and that makes most musicians just kind of a tool in a giant profit machine."

"Lately, they're aiming to modernize old hits as remakes. Imagine you come in wanting to do singer-songwriting, and they're like, 'This Madonna song. You'll make us millions.'"

- linkenski

The "F" In UFC Is "Fixed"

"The UFC was contacted by the FBI this week about fight fixing."

"Let's just say the fan base is less than shocked."

- JeffTheComposer

"Yeah, this last weekend was particularly egregious. It’s so easy to fix fights, especially with Dana taking home so much of the revenue."

- MilesTheGoodKing

"With the way that gambling has become so ubiquitous, I see this coming in all sports."

"Because so much of it is no longer just betting on the outcome of a game, but betting on things like the number of shots a particular player makes by a particular quarter, how many fouls there will be, etc, there's not only more opportunities to affect a betting outcome, but you don't just have to take the huge risk of throwing a game, you can just fake an injury or the coach could pull you earlier than they would otherwise."

"I work with a gambler who's always giving me a rundown of all his different bets and the outcomes, and so often I'm thinking, 'if the player knew that bet was out there, it would be so easy to make some money without doing anything too suspicious.'"

"The one and only sports wager I'd be willing to make is that there is rampant nefarious activity in all major sports to fix bets and that there are a series of massive scandals and waves of people going to jail in the coming years."

- LetReasonRing

"Affordable" Housing

"Affordable housing. I work in the industry, and it's a complete giveaway to rich property developers, and does very little to help poor people."

- thekaiser94

"The affordable housing complex is sick. We just need to build more housing."

- NaiveChoiceMaker

Shiny Object Syndrome

"One word: Diamonds."

- Competitive-Hunt-517

"Did that change with the rise of lab diamonds?"

- fantasy-capsule

"Depends on what area of the diamond industry you're talking about."

"Natural mining has changed a lot. You still have unethical mining, but if you buy a mined diamond from Botswana, they have more ethical mining now. And the majority of the profit from those diamonds goes to their economy, their schools."

"Lab diamonds are a good option, too. I would argue that they can be wasteful, though, and the markups on them are insane."

"Some stones are worth getting natural, and some not. For me, a white eye-clean diamond? I'm going lab. Champagne diamond? natural. Blue/pink clear sapphire? Lab. Teal Sapphire? Natural. Opalescent sapphire? Natural. Emerald? Natural. I have my reasons for each."

- Icy-Builder5892

Wellness vs. Nutrition

"Wellness/holistic industry...it rakes in just as much money as big pharma and has just as much corruption and exploitation."

- funkyfreshadelic

"(Retired pharmacist here) It's worse. It's basically unregulated, and far too many of these products have to be sold in MLMs because no legitimate store will carry them."

- wilderlowerwolves

"Oh, it’s definitely worse. At least big pharma creates products that have scientific evidence behind them that they improve or even save lives."

- Electronic-Basil-201

Charity Culture

"I worked for a religious nonprofit for years. The management was the most awful people I’ve ever met. My fellow front-line workers were the salt of the earth."

- DriedUpSquid

Pay-Per-Prayer

"Corporate 'for-profit' religion. In my mid-sized midwestern town, there are at least five to six 'campuses' of New Life Church. They are literally everywhere. Maybe people need God, but on EVERY street corner?"

"I just have my suspicions about any church that needs THAT many locations in a city that is already overrun with churches. Like d**n."

- CompetitiveRice7234

"We have Saddleback Church where I'm from. The place looks like Disneyland for rich churchgoers. A business by any other name. The owner has a private jet and is extremely wealthy. No taxes."

- TraditionalBackspace

The Ugly Side Of The Beauty Industry

"The beauty industry. It sells ‘Confidence' but thrives on insecurity. Half the products don’t do what they claim, yet the marketing keeps people chasing perfection that doesn’t even exist."

- SnowyGlazee

"I have rosacea, and my dermatologist told me I really only need a gentle cleanser and moisturizer. Most of that other stuff does nothing or can make your face worse if you have a skin condition."

- AngryGooDog

Medical Equipment Costs

"Durable Medical Equipment (wheelchairs, etc). Complete scam in terms of cost margin for the seller. You can visit the CMS website and look at the codes and rates yourself."

"It's also the easiest and most lucrative place for organized crime to commit Medicare Fraud, even with the competitive bidding systems in place."

- mynameizmyname

Crypto Culture

"Cryptocurrency. It is a product with no real-world utility, mostly unregulated, and the majority of asset ownership is concentrated in a very few number of hands. It is a scam for most small-time investors, while the sharks can manipulate the price for their own benefit."

- Loper_Legend

Buying A Car

"Auto industry."

- FragilousSpectunkery

"Have an uncle who owns a Cadillac dealership. He is rich af because of how corrupt the auto sales industry is. He says customers expect to be ripped off, taken advantage of, and pay more than they should. So when you treat them kindly, they think you are the 'good dealership.'"

- OregonBroncoNix

AI And Data Collection

"AI. We already know it is corrupt, but it's likely way worse than most of us imagine. They unleash test things on the public that could be dangerous, even get people killed. They just want money and power, and it has no real regulation yet."

- overlordThor0

"Don't forget the data centers. Convincing local councils to build housing or public infrastructure is like pulling teeth, and when they do approve them, it takes years."

"But an AI data center and they greenlight one instantly and within a year or two, what used to be nature of farmland is now a massive sink of water and power with basically zero employment opportunities for locals and all this to make absolute s**t like SpongeBob evading the police or Huntrix but pregnant."

- DeviousMelons

Behind The Curtain Of Voice Acting

"From the limited time my husband has tried diving into it and learning how corrupt it is, the voice acting industry."

"There looks to be some extremely shady business practices with how they 'cast' talent."

- prettysurethatsnotit

"This might get me downvoted, but watching how far Critical Role has bloated has reminded me that voice actors are still actors, and they can still become narcissists."

"Just a bunch of industry voice actors that recorded their DnD sessions has now become two animated TV series, merchandising, and a just recent "Character Wedding" at Radio City Music hall... like, what the f**k?!"

- boozie92

It's hard to make an ethical decision about which corporations to support, given how they're contributing to the world. But it seems that those decisions might be even more nuanced than we thought before.