In what respect do you think ruthlessly run private prisons are beneficial?
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.)
We have a tradition of treating ruthlessness in businesspeople as something of a virtue. Certainly, ruthlessness can help one get ahead in the business world, and companies often benefit from executives who're willing to put aside scruples while devising means of turning a profit. So ruthlessness in business executives can certainly be useful for businesses.
From a societal perspective though, businesses are only valuable to the extent that they increase the wealth and quality of life of society as a whole. Businesses are allowed (indeed, required, in the case of publicly traded companies) to attempt to maximize profits, on the presumption that in doing so, they'll enrich the broader society in which they operate. But there are plenty of ways in which businesses can increase their own profits without becoming more wealth productive, such as cooperating with competitors or establishing monopolies in order to keep prices artificially elevated, use of advertising to promote a product or service relative to equal or superior competitors, lobbying with politicians to slant the legal playing field in their own favor, and so forth.
I have reasons to expect myself to be somewhat biased on this issue, so I'm not sure how telling it is that I personally come up short of any examples of ruthlessness in business executives being useful from a societal perspective, when compared to business executives who're highly competitive, but compassionate, with restrictive senses of fair play. So does anyone else have examples of ruthlessness in businesspeople as a social virtue?