Those two are very different. If you don’t distinguish between them, you’ll come to absurd conclusions like “the majority of US drivers are drunk”, “vast majority of US citizens voted for Hillary”, or “the majority of US companies are breaking the law”.
> of the biggest and most prestigious companies in the country
Prestigious means nothing ‘coz it’s hard to measure that. But for biggest ones, here’s the list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_companies_by_r... Good luck finding Enron or Wells Fargo there.
The total number of financial crime cases in 2011 was around 10000. Even if we assume each case was against different company (that gives us upper estimate), that’s merely 0.17% of the US companies who were charged with financial crimes in 2011.
As you see, real data is pretty close to my anecdotal evidence.
And it very far from your reported, sourced news.
The image of the world as it’s shown in the media is extremely biased. Watch this: https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_and_ola_rosling_how_not_to_be... The video is about inequality and education, but the topic of corporate crime is skewed just as much.
There are 6 million companies operating in US, employing 115 million people. If the majority of them were breaking the law, you’d knew about that not just from the media but also from some of those 115 million people who happen to be your friends and family.
> I find it eminently believable that many or even most US companies would comply with an illegal request
I don’t find it believable because I don’t see motivation for such compliance.
In an authoritarian state, a government can abruptly take away your business (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euroset) and optionally throw you in jail for 10 years (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yukos) if you don’t comply, and you can’t do anything against it. That’s a strong motivation to comply. I don’t see such motivation for western companies.