I'm really not a fan of the rising trend to attack billionaires just because they're billionares. There are plenty of points that each of the mentioned individuals can be legitimately criticised on. Their level of wealth or the decision to donate it to one cause or another is <i>not</i> a valid point of criticism.
I much more trust the billionaires to solve the world's problems than the politicians.<p>I know it's popular to rain crap on rich people (just see Hollywood's long list of well moneyed villains) but in the Real World I have many billionaires I respect and admire (from Gates to Musk and Bezos) and ZERO politicians.
I think the operative word is <i>We,</i> because left to their own device drivers billionaires (and soon-to-be the first "Tyrell Corporation" trillionaire):<p>- narcissism, greed & hubris<p>- political, regulatory & media captures<p>become the dominating gradient vectors which tends to aggregate capital in the hands of those with the most power and extract it from those with the least. (Not a conspiracy theory, but a diffuse set of circumstances, patterns, attitudes and behaviors that snatch externalities and collapse from the jaws of success.)
The government needs to make it undesirable to become a billionaire. There should be an upper limit as to how much money you can have.<p>Most of the world's problems are caused by millionaires trying to become billionaires - Beyond a certain point, it's all zero-sum games that destroy society.
Firs thing this article takes a shot at is Bezos deploying $10b "like Gates before him."<p>Gates has, to my knowledge, been vastly more successful than any government program at reducing malaria and getting people vaccinated.<p>Which is an exact antithesis of the subheading of the article.
Another funny thing is, "we" usually attack both millionaires and billionaires. Now, millionaires are forgiven. It seems many of "we" become millionaires.
This is a false dichotomy, to put it mildly.<p>Bill Gates singlehandedly did more to eradicate Polio & several other deadly diseases than multiple Governments, WHO, and several development orgs over several decades!<p>This demonization of the billionaires is uncalled for, many of them do plenty of good for society on balance.