I would consider spending some time with Plato's Socratic dialogue The Republic if you haven't already. The tension of a timocracy devolving into an oligarchy

I would consider spending some time with Plato's Socratic dialogue The Republic if you haven't already. The tension of a timocracy devolving into an oligarchy depends greatly on the concept of justice in play at the time. I often hear in the valley "work hard, play hard" as a justification of oligarchic excess, when it should actually be "work hard, work harder" or "work hard, play less".