Nothing epitomizes greed more than the oil industry (when the trust busters broke up Rockefeller's Standard Oil, it became five of the ten largest companies in the country), but the oil industry once actively sought government oversight. One good way to illustrate this is to use the example of Signal Hill, which you should have noticied if you've ever been to Long Beach (but any of the early discoveries anywhere in the country would work the same way). Look for hundreds of rusted rocker arm oil pumps crowded as close together as is physically possible.
Any land owner with mineral rights is allowed to drill for oil. The first hole on Signal Hill blew out when the formation was penetrated, with a gusher over 100 feet high. (Drilling an oil well is similar to sticking a pin in a baloon.) Needless to say it takes high ground pressure to lift oil without the need for additional pumping. The problem is, though, that once field drive pressure is dissipated (whether through proper production methods or just blown into the sky) all of the easy money is gone from that field, and the amount of recoverable oil reduced to only a fraction of the theoretically possible maximum.
Because of the pressure underground, oil migrates to the production point. Picture a cone underground. And now picture a property line on the surface that, extended down, would cut the cone in half. Meaning that half of the oil produced from a hole on the property line would come from under the neighbors property. Meaning, of course, that you want to line your boundary with holes as close together as you can get them and as fast as you can drill them, as does your neighbor. (Under the old system, a classic case of "steal, or be stolrn from). Given that one hole at full pressure might produce under as many as 640 surface acres, there might well be a vast number of landowners all trying to be the first one to get all of the oil. Wasteful, very wasteful. And also very costly both because every well adds additonal drilling expense, and because penetrating the formation needlessly causes a drop in eventual total production (dissipates the formation drive pressure).
So Big Oil went to government and said "Organize this mess", and government did what often only government can do, and the problem was solved. Mandatory production plans are now imposed on every new field and the citizens, the earth, and the oil companies are all better off for it. Well spacing is mandated by fiat, and strict survey and accounting/auditing rules are promulgated and enforced so that even Exxon has to get up pretty early in the morning to cheat its neighbors out of their fair share (and vice versa). You see, "oil field drive pressure" is considered to be a public resource even when a portion of it is owned by the largest and greediest oil company on the planet.
Not exactly the classic example of "community" but a great one to use to tell a consevrvative "Blow it out your ass" the next time one tries to lay down that whole "government is the problem" bullshit.