The article states that the financial industry* is the "hostile AI" not all corporations (in fact, it clearly states that even the hated "energy" corporations actually provide a product - even if that ).
Having recently re-read Dan Simmons' Hyperion series (sci-fi humans vs. AI masterpiece), I could almost see the analogy perfectly - finance is key to almost every part of our individual life, business and even political machinations. And in each, the big finance outfits are impervious, indifferent and have their own goals outside of their stated purpose.
* I'd expand slightly to include all of FIRE - finance, real-estate and insurance
The corporation that feed you might do other things other places to other people.
As an example the De Beers in the diamond industry.
If crime is so evil why has its pay fed my family, paid for my house
"If farmers are so evil why have they fed my family, paid for my house and created so many amazing products we surround ourselves with" - said the cow.
Believe me, I don't disagree with that. Maybe I should emphasize that, even though I live in the Silicon Valley now, I grew up under communist dictatorship in Eastern EU. So I think I know a thing or two, from a practical standpoint, about Dystopia - the indoctrination, the forced labor, the rationing of electricity, fuel and food, the permanent fear of the secret police. That - I have not forgotten, for how could I.
All I'm saying is - this golden age could be even better, far better, if it weren't for the constant skimming of the cream that goes on all the time at the top.
If anything, it's the relative prosperity that makes it unlikely that the situation will ever be fixed. People don't rise as one, in anger, unless they are literally hungry and cold, in a physical sense. That, too, I know from first-hand experience. I've lived the incandescent emotions of the rioting mob while being one of them, out on the streets, 25 years ago, back home, in the dead of winter.
But when they are more or less sated, and provided with adequate (if not highbrow) entertainment, people will allow astonishing amounts of corruption, bribery, and downright theft to keep going at the top of the pyramid of money.
Is my belly full now? Yes. Am I more or less free to do most of the things I want? Yes. But do I still see corruption and injustice at the top, to the benefit of Big Money? Yes.
I guess I'm one of those people who are strongly motivated by principle. Injustice remains injustice no matter how pretty the makeup.
"If the rancher is so evil, why does he give me bales of hay to chew on and allowed me to become the fattest cow?"
"Evil" is (typically) not about actions or results, but about motivations and intent. Sure, you got your paycheck, but what's the intent?