And yet it is the very same startups that have improved your standard of living exponentially where luxuries reserved for the rich like private chauffeur (Uber/Lyft), matchmaking (Tinder/OkCupid), and private island vacations (Airbnb) are accessible to normal people.
Wealth is not a zero-sum game. In fact, I can prove this to you right now. Go look at the consumer price index during the end of WW2 era up until the gold standard was abolished. Compare it to today's CPI. It's not the "rich" who are evil, it is central banking by fiat which is the real evil.
As a software engineer, I'm just an entertainer for rich people. I wish they would just give me the money for free so that I could create real value working on my open source projects.
If we diverted the funding and manpower in Uber into public transportation... what happens? If we provided more affordable housing/tourist accommodations such that people did not _need_ to rent out their places in AirBnB, what happens?
The Tinder problem/solution is a weird one. It's in itself both and harmful and beneficial.
What do you mean by this?
That's due to regulatory capture and a high tax rate due to excessive regulation. There is a book I highly recommend that you read. It is called "The Kingdom of Moltz" by Irwin Schiff, a bonafide political prisoner in the United States who died for his beliefs. When you read this book, you'll realize that crony capitalism and fiat central banking has sacrificed the well-being of the vast majority of US citizens.
Just looking at Google alone, the number of startups which were acquihired and whose product was subsequently shut down is significant.
Uber is, from client's perpective, just a taxi service with ability to hails cabs through an app. Matchmaking services were available and cheap way before the Internet. As for private island vacations available for normal people via Airbnb - can you point me to one airbnb offer like that?
A farmer builds up a flock of sheep or a herd of cows, and everyone in the village is richer. A miller builds a water mill and everyone in the village gets bread. A blacksmith builds a forge and everyone in the village now has access to metal items.
Wealth is not a zero-sum game.
There are countries with an over 90% home ownership rate.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_owne...
This is false and the people who say this tend to be in elite circles so they don't see the scarcity which is obvious to everyone else.
The fact is that there aren't going to be enough builders to build houses for everyone. Why? Because those people are too busy building mansions, building yahts, building private jets, mining gold, making jewelry, mining diamond, working on useless rich people startups, etc... Rich people create scarcity through their consumption. Also rich people pay better for the same work.
And yes, investing in a useless startup is not real investing; it's consumption; the real purpose of most startups is to bring pleasure to a rich person and their friends when the startup gets acquired, not to serve society.