At a theoretical level you would expect a free market system to produce very few billionaires. Low regulatory barriers to entry and easy capital formation mean

At a theoretical level you would expect a free market system to produce very few billionaires. Low regulatory barriers to entry and easy capital formation mean high profit margins get rapidly eaten by competitors. If you look around the world today, in practice billionaires and big government do seem to go hand in hand. Consider the massive barriers to entry to the US financial system erected by very wealthy people. Or more egregiously look at the Russian oligarchs.