Should billionaires be abolished?
There's a lot I want to write about this subject but I find myself with too little time so I hope my OP can act as a starting point for people to talk about the things I'd otherwise write.
There's some issues I'd like to talk about that I'm sure people will have different views on:
1. The pervailing idea that billionaires are rich because they know more or are smarter than others results in influence on policy and ideas that may or may not be warranted, the poor are poor because they're not working hard enough and not because the rich get rich because the poor get exploited (this is the average social perception although receptivity for other views is increasing);
2. For every "good" billionaire there are a lot more "bad" billionaires, superficially I'll define "good" as someone engaged and aware of social problems and tries to fix them, like the Giving Pledge. It's not the thrust of this discussion but I'm sure we can make a moral distinction between Gates and Koch without having to get into the nitty gritty details of the moral character of billionaires;
3. Bad billionaires can buy politicians, corrupt democratic processes (but call it lobbying) and they avoid paying taxes en masse. Historically, taxes on the rich have never been lower in a misguided belief that trickle down economics work (they do work for the rich though);
4. You cannot give a platform for good billionaires without also giving a platform for bad billionaires;
5. Almost nobody can claim to have made contributions to society actually worth a billion dollars or indeed to be able to lay claim that his contribution is that much more valuable than that of teachers (without whom the billionaire couldn't hire an educated and literate workforce) or nurses (that keep his workforce healthy) or all those other people necessary to create an infrastructure in which large corporate businesses can flourish;
6. Last year billionaires became 12% richer and the lower 50% of the world population got 11% poorer. Or another juxtaposition, the 42 richest people own more wealth than the poorest 50% in the world;
7. etc. etc.
Ok, so the title lays the blame at billionaires but that's not necessarily so as we have and pursue a system that makes this possible. We could, within the system, implement 92% income tax on anyone making over a million. We can introduce much higher estate taxes again. These are all changes within the system.
There are also, possibly, changes to the system possible that will avoid or diminish these issues. One of them could be a ban on profit motive for corporations and introduce corporations with a dynamic equity system that would be the only type allowed to have a profit motive. This would result in a watering down of initial capital investments while labourers get a capital share as the value of a corporation increases and they put in hours.
There's some issues I'd like to talk about that I'm sure people will have different views on:
1. The pervailing idea that billionaires are rich because they know more or are smarter than others results in influence on policy and ideas that may or may not be warranted, the poor are poor because they're not working hard enough and not because the rich get rich because the poor get exploited (this is the average social perception although receptivity for other views is increasing);
2. For every "good" billionaire there are a lot more "bad" billionaires, superficially I'll define "good" as someone engaged and aware of social problems and tries to fix them, like the Giving Pledge. It's not the thrust of this discussion but I'm sure we can make a moral distinction between Gates and Koch without having to get into the nitty gritty details of the moral character of billionaires;
3. Bad billionaires can buy politicians, corrupt democratic processes (but call it lobbying) and they avoid paying taxes en masse. Historically, taxes on the rich have never been lower in a misguided belief that trickle down economics work (they do work for the rich though);
4. You cannot give a platform for good billionaires without also giving a platform for bad billionaires;
5. Almost nobody can claim to have made contributions to society actually worth a billion dollars or indeed to be able to lay claim that his contribution is that much more valuable than that of teachers (without whom the billionaire couldn't hire an educated and literate workforce) or nurses (that keep his workforce healthy) or all those other people necessary to create an infrastructure in which large corporate businesses can flourish;
6. Last year billionaires became 12% richer and the lower 50% of the world population got 11% poorer. Or another juxtaposition, the 42 richest people own more wealth than the poorest 50% in the world;
7. etc. etc.
Ok, so the title lays the blame at billionaires but that's not necessarily so as we have and pursue a system that makes this possible. We could, within the system, implement 92% income tax on anyone making over a million. We can introduce much higher estate taxes again. These are all changes within the system.
There are also, possibly, changes to the system possible that will avoid or diminish these issues. One of them could be a ban on profit motive for corporations and introduce corporations with a dynamic equity system that would be the only type allowed to have a profit motive. This would result in a watering down of initial capital investments while labourers get a capital share as the value of a corporation increases and they put in hours.
Comments (56)
Moreover, you're counting entirely the wrong thing. It's not the number of jobs that count, which is just counting exploited people. It's about the level of subsistance those jobs provide and the dignity that ought to go with it.
I would imagine the good billionaires would in fact stay as they recognise the negative consequences of inequality and would be supportive of change in that area. Warren Buffet himself has derided the tax system as resulting in him paying less taxes than his secretary.
Finally, You've only dealt with a situation where we'd try to make changes within the system. What about my proposal for changing the system?
Once I have everything everyone else owns, in return for a place on my lifeboat.
Why would I feed them or give them any water?
Why isn't the Earth a lifeboat?
However, if one is to make a purely monetary assessment of the situation, it does look bad.
Strange that billionaires prove that money isn't everything.
My stance ties into your point #3:
Billionaires are antithetical to a democracy.
In capitalism, money is power, and having a class of people who hold that much power just makes us an oligarchy/aristocracy.
Perhaps if you could change the government to be immune from the power of the private dollar, AND even the poorest in our country were well off, then I could imagine allowing some people to amass wealth for luxuries. Barring that, being a billionaire is immoral and undemocratic.
There could still be the equivalent of billionaires in my economy--people with access to a huge amount of very scarce resources, but the only way anyone would be able to get there is via some stroke of ingenuity that made life much much easier for the rest of us, so that, say, everyone has more than adequate shelter, food, health care, education, etc. and no one has to do much work for it.
In a nutshell, when I'm king, the competition is based on helping other people out/making their lives easier/better. The more you can do that, the more access to scarce resources you get.
Similar things have been tried, they simply don't work.
I remember being taxed 72,9% and believe me, I wasn't making a million, I was making roughly in todays prices 4 000 euros in annual income. It was then taxed by 72,9%. It really had an effect on me personally and since then I have loathed the people arguing for higher taxes "on the rich" or higher taxes. I personally know now that I am the target of those other people who want increase the taxation of "the wealthy" while not wanting to raise their own taxation. The hypocrisy of socialism is just nauseating.
The simple fact is that when taxation is so high, people simply avoid income, postpone any selling of any property that doesn't have to be sold. Better yet, hold it in cash or simply take the money abroad.
It's a simple fact that both by increasing OR decreasing taxation and tax rates, the net income of the taxation doesn't go linearly as the tax rate would imply: raising taxes don't amount to anticipated tax revenue, but also the other idea, that lowering taxes would improve revenue and hence tax income would be greater, seems also not to work.
Better yet, I propose that anybody who proposes a tax increase to others, should pay the similar tax.
And ought billionaires be abolished? Profiting from the capitalist system is a totally another thing to profiting from a criminal enterprise or racket. Of course, the pure leftist doesn't see any difference there.
How do you figure?
1. Property, ownership, and money are social constructs.
Therefore;
2. Billionaires are rich because we agree that they are, not because they are smarter or more industrious...
3. I no longer agree.
4. Companies are global, but governance is still local, and so governments are no longer in control.
5. Without International agreement on transparency, an end to tax havens and enforcement that reaches all parts, nothing can be done.
6. That's why big business seeks to undermine international cooperation EU, Nato, etc.
That's part of why the answer is to instead reward people based on the extent to which they help other people/provide the things that other people want.
The way the system is set up, as you're describing, is that you wind up with less for yourself the more you help others (via your tax dollars). If we instead make it that the way you get more for yourself, more scarce resources, is by doing more to help others, then you have an incentive rather than a disincentive to help.
I would put it this way: If you have a healthy prosperous economy, you can afford a welfare state and all the perks that come with it. Hence the state should have at first priority the economy and the keeping the instititutions operating that keep the economy healthy (that prevent corruption, guarantee property rights and human rights, maintain and develop the needed infrastructure).
Above all, one has to have a power elite and rich class that feels that it is their obligation or role to take care of the ordinary people and the poor. One typical way is for the power elite to be patriotic and have a sense that they have a mission for the country.
At worst the power elite and the rich are afraid to loose their power and wealth and percieve "the people" as a threat, as the ignorant violent rabble, that has to be policed and prevented from destroying the society and collapsing everything into anarchy. In this case there isn't much if any social cohesion, and you basically have this feeling of class warfare.
Absolute nonsense.
Enough people aren't just interested in doing that. When there is a will, there is a way.
Then go earn your billions.
The exact motivational value of billionaires is dubious. Few adults entertain such fictions, and you can be rich and/or famous without being a billionaire.
Quoting Hanover
The problem with that approach is that their wealth is their influence. Massive economic power is always going to be power, no matter the political system.
Quoting ssu
Isn't the economy a contingent goal given your own argument? The actual first priority is the well being of the citizens. The economy is a means to an end.
Quoting ssu
Care to explain why one "has to" have a power elite in the first place?
Quoting ssu
So, your argument is that we should fear the rich, and therefore not antagonize them?
Care to give an example of a country that doesn't have a power elite? An executive branch?
Basically any kind of centralized government means that there is in one form or another a power elite. Quite ignorant or hypocrite to assume there wouldn't be a power elite.
Quoting Echarmion
No, absolutely not, my argument is that a healthy society starts with social cohesion. Antagonizing classes against each other isn't the way to create prosperity for all.
And do notice that the power elite doesn't have to be bunch of rich billionaires and wealthy families. It can be, like in the case of Venezuela, adamant socialists clinging to their power. Or in the case of China, a communist party that has thrown away communism and replaced it with state run capitalism, which could be described as fascism.
I would have no problem with greater taxation.
It's impenetrability is seen in the long run. Whatever gains we make are overturned later on. Witness the present situation as the US is $20 trillion in debt, and the rich are due for a tax break.
The rich do two things with their money: 1) use it to make more money, and 2) use it to protect their ability to make more money.
Yes.
But do note that any political ideology starts as the objective being "the well being of the citizens". This well being then can be tried to be reached with quite horrible means, starting with killing off a social class or an ethnic or racial minority.
I made the emphasis as typically in the West nowdays it's just assumed that economy will do just fine and is taken as granted. And do note that it's the institutions themselves that also protects the citizens from monopolies, cartels or corruption.
That is, if corruption isn't made legal as in the US.
Well you surely see that without Mr Jobs and Mr Gates, there would be no working computers because RiscOS and Linux etc etc etc don't exist.
Speaking of research and development, people who think no one will work unless they can get rich, should look at Bell Laboratories (now Lucent Technology). The researchers at Bell Labs came up with many discoveries which enabled various new industries. University researchers come up with new ideas all the time, and generally the University owns the patents. That doesn't mean the researchers aren't rewarded, just that the rewards are reasonable.
People can be in power without forming a "class" or a specific "elite" group. Which is difficult and has very rarely been achieved. I was merely commenting that the an "elite" is not logically necessary.
Quoting ssu
It is a nice thought that we should just all get along, but arguing that we shouldn't be "antagonizing" each other is vague. Of course we shouldn't be putting people to the guillotine. But there needs to be some amount of "antagonizing" to change the status quo.
Quoting ssu
People in power do have the tendency to be filthy rich though, and filthy rich people always have power.
Quoting ssu
Does it? What about a theocracy? Or just a feudal society that puts people in boxes which determines their rights? The well being of citizens in general is not always the stated goal of a political ideology.
Quoting ssu
I don't know about that. It seems to me that governments are very anxious to be seen as the driving force behind the economy. As long as it's trending up, anyways. "The economy" has been the major factor in a lot of general elections across the West in recent memory.
When you say power elite, I read authoritarian. The use of authoritarianism is a choice that came along with setting up civilization... using crops... defending the idea of property. It ultimately comes down collecting a population with belief in some ideal or the other so as to concentrate large populations of human will into the hands of very few people.
It's also an idea that repeatedly fails in terms of stability of organization.
Now human will is so tightly concentrated that a single human being can launch weapons that will destroy the ecosystem.
We can't afford large systems of concentrated human power. Humans are evolved to exist in small groups with leaders who are directly connected to the people they are leading. In other words, if a small group leader screws up, the group is able to directly interact with the leader to express their disapproval.
Small group leaders that make bad decisions don't stay leaders for long.
In contrast to this large group leaders are quarantined from direct feedback from the vast majority of people being led. So the leader is no longer part of the community that sent him/her to Washington D.C. with the same general interests as the community that elected him/her. Instead the community of leaders in Washington D.C. becomes the elected leaders new community and the newly elected leader interest begin to conform with those of other leaders and not the community that elected them.
We have a fiction that presidents or politicians are our leaders...when in fact it is easily seen that billionaires are the true leaders.
I have very few interests in common with a billionaire, or the system that is currently doing it's best to wreck the planet.
MMT would say the way to manage this would be selective taxes on the very wealthy - to take those dollars out of the economy and allow the government to use them to stimulate economic activity if times of high unemployment.
The thing about taxes is that they are set by a government which will quickly become owned by the wealthiest in the system. Any government...
Everyone uses money, why would we need government to cut the wealthy down to size especially when the government is paid to be inclined not to intervene?
What would happen to the economy if everyone with a loan payment decided to skip a month...
The same month?
So those with significant wealth ought advocate for laws to protect their wealth and those without significant wealth ought advocate for wealth distribution?
That seems to be a morality based upon self-interest. I think you'd advocate for greater wealth distribution even if it meant personal loss to your own wealth, arguing that societal well being is overall increased even if it means you personally might suffer in the short term. So, assuming the right is as righteous as the left, we might also assume their ideology allows for their own personal suffering for better overall societal success.
That is, the billionaire who advocates for greater income distribution is as logical as the working class guy who wants less income distribution as both believe their respective ideologies (whether libertarian, socialist, or whatever) lead to a more overall prosperous society.
It's as fair to call a rich socialist a product of social engineering as it is to call a poor libertarian one.
You've gone off on a few different tangents there, but it should be clear my moral perspective on economic issues is utilitarian-based. If redistributing wealth back away from the super-rich (as was done in the US from the forties to the seventies before the flow reversed again) into social programs that benefit the less well-off in terms of healthcare, education, opportunity etc. results in greater wealth and well-being for more people than not doing so, then I am for it. If it were the case that doing so resulted in less overall well-being, I would be against it. I believe the former and therefore am for it.
Nicely put! :up:
I didn't go off on a tangent. It was directly responsive to your post. My point was that your Utilitarian approach could equally apply to the right, with the argument being that allowing uncontrolled wealth could result in overall societal benefit. This means that your amazement is unjustified. The billionaires haven't tricked the poor into supporting the unjust wealth of the rich. The poor just realize they'd be poorer under a different system.
So, you're laughably empirically wrong.
https://www.demos.org/blog/10/20/15/united-states-vs-denmark-17-charts
Amazingly, the poor are not better off when you redistribute money away from them to the rich, but are when you redistribute money from the rich to them. But you're illustrating my point very well re the prevailing ideology if against all the evidence, you actually believe what you are saying.
If that is right then this:
Quoting unenlightened
simply isn't true.
If you like. It evolves naturally though, so we're just chasing words around here.
The world after capitalism will also have to emerge naturally and organically from history.
If it's rarely been achieved, then tell me the example.
Quoting Echarmion
And changing the "status quo" means today attacking some group of people, who are described to be harmful.
Quoting Echarmion
In my country politicians aren't rich and typically aren't millionaires and don't retire millionaires. There are very few if any that have a wealth of over 1 billion. That politicians hoard huge fortunes just means that the legal institutions that should prevent corruption don't exist or are weak.
Quoting Echarmion
Wow, that's pretty thick. A theocracy, those building a "New Jerusalem" or whatever especially want the best to people. First of all, they want to save their souls, create a more righteous society A theocracy is a case and point example of this.
And a feudal society? Even feudalism has a logic to itself in a society where centralized government hasn't either been created or has dissolved (as when Antiquity turned to the Dark Ages).
Quoting Echarmion
And during a recession it somebody else's fault or the fault of the other party that was in power, yes.
What I was trying to say was that when people take the economy for granted, it means that the economy, the tax income it can possible get and employment are basically stationary and given. And if there is growth in an economic upturn is taken as granted. It's just the rich people who take far more than what would be their fare share. The populist discourse always takes the stance that "ordinary" people have been the victims and the fault is, well, you name it, some hated segment of the society.
Well, Denmark has 10 or so billionaires to 5,8 million people. The US with 327 million people and 585 billionaires. That means if I counted correctly, there are more billionaires per capita in Denmark than in the US! Anyway, the figure is in the same ballpark here.
With this in mind, your statistical comparison about US and Denmark just shows how ridiculous is the idea of "banning" billionaires is to either wealth distribution or in fighting povetry. These things are a bit more nuanced. And btw, in Denmark the top rate for capital income is 42% and the tax ceiling goes on at 52,5% (similar as here) hence it's a far cry from Benkei's 92%.
Here's an interesting video to consider: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydKcaIE6O1k&t=9s
There are many Americans living in absolute poverty, other Western countries have increased taxes not just for billionaires but everyone. To allow for socialist policies which help disadvantaged people have a chance in life.
Another thing to consider is capital is increasing faster than the economy, which means the rich will get richer at a faster rate than everyone else. This will lead to increases in wealth inequality and it may mostly just come down to the inheritance of capital.
I don't know all the ramifications of what might happen if a very high tax rate existed in this day and age but there are lots of good reasons to want wealth redistribution.
Do people like having a limit? When one imposes a ceiling of sorts people don't like it. The point of keeping the options unlimited is that even though a few may become excessively rich but many become, as you said, "rich and/or famous without being a billionaire". I guess it's an effect of our system that revolves around money.
Even when we switch gears on what it means to succeed by saying publishing a paper in a reputed journal is a mark of an achiever, there will be the genius who publishes more than anyone else. Yet, this particular person who does so is a motivator or model to emulate.
My issue with Hanover concerned what kind of system the relatively poor are better off in and where therefore their interests lie in promoting. And that's a system where those with more wealth than them pay high taxes and the income from those taxes is redistributed into social programs in the way I previously outlined, as is the case in Denmark (or as some left-wing Democrats advocate). That was the context that I raised at least.
How far that can be taken in practice is another question. A unilateral sudden jump to 92% tax rates and a ban on billionaires in an advanced democracy entwined in the global financial system is likely to lead to huge capital flight and may very well hurt everyone including the less well off (to that extent I'd agree with Hanover, but that's probably as far as our agreement goes). So, moves to reverse the increasing concentration of wealth in fewer hands need to be carefully managed, obviously.
you said ‘It's about the level of subsistance those jobs provide and the dignity that ought to go with it.,
Just how would banning billionaires achieve this? If you hold billionaires responsible for this state of affairs just how are they responsible for it? How would removing them achieve this?
As you agree with the obvious result of ban on billionaires and 92% tax rate, I should point out it doesn't result only in capital flight, but basically can cause a brain drain too and other severe consequences. It should be noted that even with wealth distribution and povetry eradicated by a welfare state, you do get billionaires. So what happens when we ban billionaires?
Let's take your model of Denmark. Of those 10 Danish billionaires four belong to one family, the Kristiansen family. And what sinister bad thing have they done? Basically their grandfather (and to the next generation their great grandfather) founded a toy company called LEGO. Hence the question is,how much revenue for Denmark has LEGO bought and that LEGOLAND is in the small town where the founder of the company was born? The vast majority of the 17 000 employees work in Denmark and is the 12th biggest employer in the country. In fact, all 10 Danish billionaires are competing in the global market, not "stealing" their entire wealth from the Danes (as there are only 5,8 million people). But for Benkei this is evil and Denmark would be far better off with the Kristiansen family moving their business to the US, where the bigger market is. Because with that 92% tax rate after one million, it would have be rather difficult to invest in LEGO at the first place to grow to the size it is. And as the company is a family owned business, obviously it's not just an investment.
Perhaps one question here would be to define just who is a "good" and who "bad" billionaire, as Benkei in the OP defined billionaires. One easy test for this is simple:
"Has the billionaire made his fortune with a great product or service on the global market or not?"
This is crucial. The global market isn't controlled by one country and hence corrupt ties to political leadership cannot be the reason for success in the marketplace, when you have alternative places like the US, EU, China, Russia, Japan etc. With that mix of countries, you simply cannot profit from political ties to the leadership of all countries.
And here you can see the difference with lets say the Kristiansen-family and for example Carlos Slim. Even if Slim's América Móvil operates in other countries (mainly Latin America), it's road to fortune came from seizing the Mexican telecommunications market. Hence Slim's fortune have to do a lot with on the decisions of the Mexican government. When it comes to an aggressive toy company that had the revolutionary idea in the 1940's to change from wood to plastic in toys, the success hardly has come from warm relations with the Danish political elite.
Typically the billionaires that have basically their business in one country, have in their background either a monopoly or a near monopoly, which has been granted by the government of that country. I don't know of any Russian oligarchs that has had his company being successful in enlarging their operations substantially outside Russia. Here the real problems rise of wealth and power, when the government institutions are weak and you get a vicious circle where private business profits from government decisions and then gets more political power. Worst case private entities simply cannot compete outside the countries borders as they are in no way capable of competing in the global market.
And then there are the billionaire thieves like Ferdinand Marcos, the dictator of the Phillipines and of course Vladimir Putin, likely the richest man in the World. These indeed are the "bad" billionaires.
You can not emulate genius, you either are or are not. If we take the common meaning of genius.
You seem to be assuming that being driven to succeed is a universal good. We can point to driven people and wonder why they make weapons. If being driven to succeed is a good thing then why can it have such catastrophically bad results? Sometimes good does come of being driven to succeed, but sometimes not.
So maybe ambition is neutral and not necessarily a good thing.
Then you have to wonder about success. Is it really "success" to become less empathetic and caring as your wallet thickens? How can success involve the loss of key elements of a person's character?
Maybe an alternate strategy would be to be driven to wholeheartedly work for your community's success... I'm not saying to offer a product or service and demand wealth in return... but truly use whatever talent one has to forward the goals and aspiration of everyone. A billionaire builds himself higher first... with a nice long jump down to the rest of us. A humanitarian builds the community on the foundation of her talents.
We can not attribute anything like the second attitude to billionaires.
Why do community work and resources need to be concentrated into one pair of hands?
Leadership?
{snorts}
""It had meant nothing, solved nothing, and proved nothing; and in so doing had killed 8,538,315 men and variously wounded 21,219,452. Of 7,750,919 others taken prisoner or missing, well over a million were later presumed dead; thus the total deaths (not counting civilians) approach ten million. The moral and mental defects of the leaders of the human race had been demonstrated with some exactitude. One of them (Woodrow Wilson) later admitted that the war had been fought for business interests; another (David Lloyd George) had told a newspaperman: ‘If people really knew, the war would be stopped tomorrow, but of course they don’t—and can’t know."
10,000 years of civilized history... ten times a thousand years of kings and the spiteful folly of kings... and still we cry to the heavens for a leader... a savior...
We aren't really very bright for an intelligent species.
Wealth is a lever one person uses to move the world.
Foolish to trust any human with that kind of power.
I'm interested to know.
You have pointed out a relevant fact - human nature. It's the flaws in it that result in the deplorable situations you describe. On that view wouldn't you agree that any system would fail as miserably. Let's take communism for example - perfect on paper (no billionaires possible) and yet a complete disaster. The sam reason - human folly as you so eloquently put it.
So, what kind of a system do you propose to replace the one which allows for billionaires to exist?
I have some ideas, but it's important to note that I wasn't actually pointing out elements of human nature. What I was pointing out is that the model we base our society on tends to emphasize certain elements of human character... or nature if you prefer. In the case of an agrarian lifestyle what you see, is what we typically think of as human nature... competitive drive... greed... ego. But only because we have been in a sense domesticated to this pattern. These human traits are emphasized by our choice to defend a plot of ground rather than roam around finding stuff to eat.
If we look at the hunter-gatherer lifestyle we see a different set of human character traits emphasized by that choice. Ideas of property and time are different... tendency toward in group cooperation rather than competition. Things of that nature... Without any romanticizing of a noble savage.
A good example of the direct different that serves as a case in my larger point. When we dig up hunter gatherer communities, we find houses of similar kind and size. When a culture shifts to a agrarian mode, we immediately begin to see mansions and huts.
The point of all this is that mode of living matters when it comes to engineering a community. If the mode of living is not sustainable as agriculture is not, due to a variety of factors that amount to a negative running solar energy balance. (monocropping reduces diversity and reduces the ability of that area to accept solar energy in sustainable forms, plowing requires enormous human and/or animal/ and or fossil fuel energy inputs.. that require ever larger areas or ecosystem disruption...)...
...if the mode of living is not sustainable even in terms of tens of thousands of years... then it is not a wise choice for any long term society to adopt.
If we want to discuss developing a lifestyle model that emphasizes certain human character traits within that society then we'd have to come to some kind of agreement as to what the the ultimate goals are and then decide which human traits might best found a society to achieve those goals.
Think Frank Herbert's Dune.
So, sure I have ideas, and when everyone agrees I'm the ruler of the world... I'll start trying stuff.
Please no one make me the ruler of the world...
Actually, I think we are coming to a series of paradigm shifts, everything we see happening indicates a coming discontinuity.
What happens then will determine the elements of human character that history emphasizes in the coming age... if any.
Some ideas: Negative growth economy. Diversify production and power generation down to small group size. Recognize that human evolved to live in groups of 50-150 and use modern techniques to expand that to some optimum size that prevents the forming of large political blocs capable of changing the underlying society. Smaller conflicts are sustainable maybe even desirable under conditions of consent, larger conflicts are not. Group membership should not be coerced in anyway. Individual rights are equal to group rights in that neither should impose their will on the other. Same for individual to individual and group to group action. Probably do this by emphasizing a set of lifestyles that emphasize group cooperation at Navy Seal levels. The sanctity of human life needs to be correctly balanced against the ecosystem....
I could go on and on. Essentially bring down human population in a controllable way and start figure out the maximum sustainable human population we can achieve using the sun's energy budget and stick to that. If we want to expand we need to move into space... and develop the society that can do so.
I wonder though how we could control our innate urges to do better than the Joneses. Competitive behavior is natural to us but I guess it was more about becoming and staying equal with your opponents. It wasn't about outdoing them and letting opponents eat your dust. The current economic paradigm is about growth, growth and more growth. It's this attitude that's doing the harm - pitting us against each other in a cutthroat competitive race to be bigger, probably not better, than everyone else. I guess economists don't know what uncontrolled growth means. Cancer?!
However, to be fair, we must remember that the opportunities have been equal. Rags to riches stories are more common than the rich getting richer. It's like conducting a fair examination - equality but there are bound to be smarter people who do better. Is it the fault of the system which seems correctable or is the problem in, say, our genes which is intractable?
Competitiveness is an element of human character... In our society it is emphasized to the point of being a super power compared to some other lifestyles.... I mean that literally.
So, while competitiveness is a characteristic so is cooperation. What would a world society built on cooperation look like...?
{shrugs}
When I really get to thinking about it, it kinda boggles my brain.
So because of agriculture we've been led into defending fields that once supported anyone that walked across them. Because of agriculture we've had to develop money, and property and authority.
These things are not necessary to our survival... and the creation of them in a competitive environment leads to just about every human crime you can think of.
Without these things Human population doubled every ten thousand years... The lifestyle was sustainable and lasted some 190,000 years and generated a final human population of 5-10 million individuals.
There was still competition, and murder and every other expression of the human character... but the balance was much more even and less specialized. Can't go back to that even if we wanted to, but there are structural elements of these groups that could inform a more sustainable society and population within the energy budget given by the sun.
Getting there from here would likely be very difficult... to say the least.
What about winning the lottery or are you specifically referring to moguls like Jeff Bezos?