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Desrtopa comments on Is ruthlessness in business executives ever useful? - Less Wrong
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Yvain covers the issues with privately owned prisons in his non-libertarian FAQ. In what respect do you think ruthlessly run private prisons are beneficial?
When it comes to weapons dealers, I concede that if you consider the country in which they are based, and not the countries to which they make their sales, to be "the society in which they operate," then increased ruthlessness is likely to result in increased enrichment of their society. If you count net gains by ignoring associated costs incurred elsewhere, then there are certainly "ruthless" ways to make businesses more productive. If your perspective deals exclusively with a single country, then you'll want to avoid companies applying this principle on a state level (extracting tax concessions from state governments to persuade them to move their operations from one state to another, for example,) but applying it on the country level would seem perfectly acceptable.
The way I look at social goods, I'm not inclined to regard such a thing as valuable, but naturally, national governments have reason to disagree.
Thank you for linking to this, I am finding it to be a good read!
Not the question you asked, but something I'll say up front: I am not in favor of private prisons, ruthless or ruthful.
There are no ruthful prisons. Prisons "increase the wealth and quality of life of society as a whole" (as thought-experimental evidence, mentally open all the prisons right this very moment and measure if society is improved, harmed or no change occurs). By "as a whole" I do not mean 'in every instance' but perhaps I have projected my meaning on your words. Prison is great for most people, and rotten for those in it. Private prisons should not exist, but they do, and as ruthless institutions they thrive. I specified private prisons because your question was about businesses and therefore would not include government prisons.
We agree weapons merchants thrive by ruthlessness, even if in the office they are all smiles and handshakes.
It seems to me that the ruthless response to someone I consider (a) dangerous enough in principle to be worth worrying about and (b) currently powerless enough that I can dispose of them as I wish with impunity, is to kill rather than imprison them.
Which suggests that all prisons are ruthful.
(For the record: Not only am I not encouraging it, I actively assert that killing prisoners is a lousy idea. We should not kill prisoners. Especially not identifiable prisoners.)