TL;DR => The author could live in France instead<p>Money does good only when it's usefully spent, and governments are very bad at spending wisely because politicians' interests are unlikely to be aligned with the people's.<p>Point by point:<p>- your money doesn't belong to you, but to society: "They participate in a co-operative venture with others", but it's a venture which would NOT exist without THEM in the first place. They have created value to the society, the society itself doesn't create value. It's their money. How simple is that?<p>- most "rich" people don't participate as much in politics as you might think. How many entrepreneurs are in politics? This argument seems very weak to me.<p>- inequality is built into our society, because we're all different, have different abilities, etc. You must now choose to make the poor richer, or the rich poorer. You must choose between helping the people UP, or force the high performers to keep a low profile. Guess where each will take the society.<p>It boils down to Liberty vs. Equality.<p>I live in a country (France) where politicians chose equality, and I can tell you that the word Liberty is very seldom pronounced.