Corruption is oftentimes a measure of how sordid the activities of the "other guys" are, but the process of corruption - whatever that means really - also has to take into account the ambient atmosphere and all that entails. In other words, concentrated wealth itself is inherently corrupting to whomever bears witness to it, which in a highly interconnected world with advanced communications technologies, is virtually anywhere at any time. So it becomes the high watermark - within wealthy society and without - of what will always be possible, and there will always be a portion of any population that desires it, so that there is a relentless striving towards it that pervades a society's efforts and activity.
