The political gamesmanship in the US is beyond shameful, but that's different in an important way. When the government passively denies you a service by shutting down, that's negligence. When the government actively makes a service worse, that's cruelty for the sake of cruelty, and rightfully gets called out. But when a company actively makes a service worse to induce demand, that's a fat bonus for a PM, where instead we should be calling it out for the cruelty that it is.
Or to put it another way, for a government, cruelty is done for its own sake. In a corporation, cruelty is economically incentivized.
I can also see a "unifying mental model" -- whatever increases the "health" is pursued.
A corporation needs to "feed" on money, so its actions reflect this (e.g. PMs worsening services intentionally, in order to be able to charge more and thereby boost revenue).
A party in power needs to "feed" on support from its "base", so its actions reflect this (you said it best: "for the sake of cruelty")
Or to put it another way, for a government, cruelty is done for its own sake. In a corporation, cruelty is economically incentivized.