Elon Musk is the richest man alive.
Sam Altman is god-like powerful.
Mark Zuckerberg can make your business disappear.
Dario Amodei can start or stop a war.

But none of them is as powerful as Henry Ford or Rockefeller were at their peak.

Today, it feels like a handful of men can shape the destiny of the entire world.

But this is hardly new.

The Economist made an estimate of who are the most powerful (American) men in history.

Turns out, Henry Ford has been the most powerful of all!

He employed an insane amount of people: about 0.15% of the American population.

His wealth represented over 1% of American GDP.

Plus, he had full control over his huge company.

Jeff Bezos is the only person alive who comes close.

Amazon employs more than a million people, and Bezos is obviously extremely wealthy. But he does not control Amazon the way Henry controlled Ford.

The same applies to Elon Musk, despite his enormous wealth.

AI bosses rank much lower, below position 35.

The bottom line is that we are not experiencing something new.

Every major technological revolution created its own tycoons, who accumulated amazing wealth and power.

One can argue they accumulate too much power and wealth.

But some of these people built the systems we now take for granted.

Without Ford, we wouldn't be driving cars.

Without Jay Gould, we wouldn't travel by train either.

AI and digital technology have not reached their full impact yet.

Only later will we understand the real historical importance of Bezos & Co.