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Have billionaires accumulated their wealth illegitimately?
- CharlesColeman 7y agoThis article is kinda asking the wrong question. If they want to analyze the slogan "every billionaire is a policy failure," they need to focus the policy itself and its results, not if the billionaires followed the policy. To illustrate this in another area: if the slogan was "every polluted river is a policy failure," [1] it's a poor response to answer "the river was polluted fair and square according to the rules!" [1] e.g. https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Cuyahoga_River_Fire https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Cuyahoga_River_Fire
- Bostonian 7y agoIt looks like they just decided that a billionaire who earned his money in certain industries did so illegitimately. That is arbitrary and unpersuasive. "Our analysis identifies industries where rent-seeking is common, including mining, defence, construction and casinos. This time it also includes the largest tech companies, since many of them have engaged in anticompetitive practices. Three-quarters of billionaires’ wealth in advanced economies was fairly acquired. Still, rentier wealth has risen relative to gdp. Some countries are more cronyfied than others. Sweden and Germany less so. But in America rent-seeking industries made one in five billionaires and explain a third of total billionaire wealth."