The behavior described in the article shows people of means taking away money from people who are no financial threat to them because they can.

It doesn't matter what the tide does if somebody scuttles your boat.

Suppose I owned a corner grocery store that served a neighborhood. It is illogical to believe that the business succeeds by making the neighborhood poorer. If I captured the wealth of the neighborhood, I'd be out of business because no one would be able to shop in my store anymore. Instead, I would have to work to provide a service to the neighborhood at a competitive price while no doubt employing quite a few people who live nearby. By creating the business, I'm creating jobs and wealth not just for myself but for others as well.

Suppose I own Walmart. I'm going to march into your little town and convince the town, with my many well-dressed and well-spoken representatives, that Walmart will be good for the community. More jobs, etc. And for a while, that's true. I, however, am not satisfied with being the biggest fish in the pond. I want the pond to myself. I go after all the businesses in town, aggressively, in the best capitalist tradition. Your little rinky-dink store can't compete with my muscle, because no matter that you know all your customers and all of their children by name, I can lowball your prices every time. Same for the hardware store and the service station and the drug store. Pretty soon, Walmart is the only game in town, and you've lost your whole investment. Downtown is a hollow shell. And me? Well, this store isn't turning the profit I want, so the prices go up. Why should I care about the people who live here? I don't. If I want to close the store as part of an overall corporate strategy and leave everyone unemployed, that's just good business.

And then you have Bill Gates, an enigmatic figure. You can ask his competitors, and they'll give you one picture, but the beneficiaries of his philanthropy will give you another. Maybe he's one of the looneys.

Capitalism likes to put on airs about how morally superior it is to socialism. However, their arguments have no clothes. Capitalism is the systematic manifestation of greed enacted as corporate policy where a ruling elite gets to decide the fates of whole towns based on their profit margins, with no regard to the fates of others except as dictated by corporations' consciences.

It's easy to reduce things to sweeping statements. I can do it too.

Behemoths unchecked are behemoths, be they government, corporate or individual. If the seesaw is unbalanced, nobody rides.

Regards--
Mary Anne