This was my epiphany a few days ago walking back from the gym.
Obviously extreme wealth inequality is bad, but I think one of the worst things is that with extreme wealth inequality, you can start purchasing people (in the mercenary sense, not human trafficking).
Back in the Silk Road days, there’s like a whole mercenary/hitman category that you can pay someone to off someone.
But you need two conditions for this transaction to make sense:
- Someone that deems the money worth the risk
- Your status in society remains the same
Imagine two societies with 10 people with different wealth distributions
Society 1 distribution: 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100
Society 2 distribution: 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 505
In society 1, the guy with 100 can probably pay the guy with 10 to do something risky, but the incentive for the guy with 10 is very low, because even if he gets paid 30, his status in society doesn’t really elevate by much, and the guy with 100 can’t offer more because he would drop his status in society.
Whereas in society 2, the guy with 505 can literally bring someone to be the second richest person while remaining as the top dawg. In this case, you’re very likely to get someone to do bad things for you, because afterwards they will become the top 1% with you.
That’s pretty dangerous.