morality is supposed to protect people’s personal autonomy and freedom, even when others in their community dislike or disagree with their choices.
We might scratch our heads or shake our heads at Bezos taking over Venice for his wedding or his giant yacht. But Americans largely believe it is his right to spend his wealth as he sees fit.
On the other side, morality is supposed to protect people from harm. When a community comes to see something as unreasonably harmful – drunken driving, child labor, smoking indoors – it moves collectively to prevent that harm, typically by regulating or forbidding the behavior and punishing those who do it.
At their core, these are disputes about where the line falls between a harm serious enough to warrant control and a freedom too important to override.
And this is where the issue of extreme wealth is located – sitting precisely on this moral fault line.
On one side, there is a moral claim that arguably lies at the heart of the “American Dream”: People have the right to keep and enjoy what their own efforts, talent and willingness to take risks produces. They also have a right to make their own way in the world, without undue interference, based on their own abilities to do so. They should be free to decide what to do with the wealth they have earned, including leaving it to current and future family members after death.
On the other side, there are serious moral harms to be prevented. Past a certain point, wealth stops being only money and becomes a detrimental form of power over others: People like Elon Musk have the capacity to shape markets such as the SpaceX IPO, influence politics by donating hundreds of millions to campaigns, and control major platforms where public debate happens, such as Twitter, now X.
The gap that extreme wealth creates does not just mean some people have far more; it means a minority have the power to ensure that [the majority has far less](As billionaires’ wealth soars, US workers struggle: ‘The rich keep getting richer for no good reason’ | US income inequality | The Guardian).
I believe a cogent argument that the US capitalist system no longer works for a vast number of Americans. That upward mobility is stifled. Public confidence in the U.S. capitalist system has dropped significantly.
Many would agree with the statement:“Your life is working and we don’t have anything to show for it. There’s no savings, there’s no retirement plan. I can’t even afford to buy a house."
How long can the above remain unaddressed? Our nation ignored the destruction of US factory workers economic livelihood and following the opioid epidemic amongst those tossed from gainful employment to low pay jobs.
Economic struggling has spread to the US middle class.
Have we reached the tipping point that Peter Turchin talks about?
A bloated elite class, with too few elite jobs to go around; declining living standards among the general population; and a government that can’t cover its financial positions.
A societal or national upheaval perhaps including violence?
Most upheavals or disappears are a result on environmental change that causes famine.
Three come to mind about inequality & economics:1)French revolution 2)Russian Civil war 3)Weimar Republic collapse
I kinda wish I’d be around to see what happens. I expect I will die within 10 years.