Let's liquidate all US billionaires and spread that money to every person in the US. Let's also set aside the question of how one could legally liquidate the billionaires.

Per https://www.forbes.com/sites/tommybeer/2020/05/21/the-net-wo... the combined net worth of every US billionaire was 3.4 trillion in May of this year. Per https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/3-ways-that-the-u-s-popu... there were 331 million Americans in January of this year.

Dividing that out: $10,271.90 per person. Not enough to live on the passive income even in the cheapest parts of the globe.

OR, just parcel out land and give people seeds and allow them to trade with nearby neighbors... There's no longer a need for money and everyone gets to eat - which is all we really need. Beyond that, people can help each other build homes in smallish communities. Money, even on a planet with this many people, isn't necessary, because it's like people driving cars - the system works because everyone is operating to keep themselves alive. HN is not a fan of this take.

>HN is not a fan of this take.

Probably because it sounds like utopian nonsense.

It's not really. That would fund the US Government for about 9 months.

They were probably just responding to how I framed the question.

Because most people in society, across all wealth levels, refuse to live within their means. I was quite disappointed when I discovered this, because I thought that if I made enough money, I'd be able to support all my family. But then I started noticing that the people who were broke generally had newer cars and computers than I did, and that families with multiple six-figure incomes were spending their way into bankruptcy. And the government does it too, accumulating ever more debt.

The very highest wealth level does live within their means. It's hard to spend 10 billion dollars on houses and cars.

You need a large amount of capital for it to do enough good for others (e.g. via investments into companies) that the returns you receive are enough to live on.