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planners created a back door for indirectly regulating<br />
industries. As time passed, the planners delegated to the<br />
cartel leaders more and more regulatory power over their<br />
own industries. 12 The government rewarded promising<br />
party members with top executive positions in “private”<br />
companies, and it offered devoted Nazi businessmen<br />
government positions in one of the numerous regulatory<br />
agencies. By 1938, it was virtually impossible to distinguish<br />
the business interests from the party interests in<br />
the cartel hierarchy. 13<br />
In Nazi Germany, the cost of being a political outsider<br />
was extremely high. In addition to indirectly regulating<br />
nonconnected firms out of business, the Nazi state<br />
often directly seized the means of production and property<br />
from its political enemies, from Jewish Germans,<br />
and from conquered peoples. In 1938, the Third Reich<br />
passed a law that stripped Jewish Germans of all claims<br />
to property and businesses and seized these assets. The<br />
party distributed the spoils of this direct theft to its top<br />
members and their allies and relatives. 14 After the German<br />
military conquered an area, it passed decrees that limited<br />
the native population’s ability to transact and run their<br />
businesses. In Bohemia-Moravia, large domestic firms<br />
had to appoint a native German to the board of directors<br />
in order to do business. 15 Regulations like this one<br />
effectively transferred ownership to connected German<br />
parties. These occurrences serve to illustrate how political<br />
influence trumped competition and value creation in<br />
Nazi economic policy.<br />
One of the easiest ways to survive in business in Nazi<br />
Germany was to devote time and resources toward cozying<br />
up to powerful members of the Nazi party. Those<br />
FASCISM 43