One defining quality is that billionaires need to scale work that often involves management. In this case consider prolific basketball coaches, or generals in war.
The reason I shy away from including politicians, is because their m.o is starkly different: it’s all about status.
Either way, I think your argument is weak. “Sure you feel this away about billionaires. But change ‘billionaire’ to something different and your feelings change.”
Well, duh. That’s not even an analogy. You’re just literally changing the subject of the sentence. Billionaires are super different than writers in ways that are relevant to this discussion.
Most people have a natural bias towards billionaires. To remove the particulars of the essay, to look at it with fresh eyes.
Yes, indeed it changes things, and no one change will map completely. Do this a few times though and a clearer sight comes through
And founders are not?
Some founders are at that level, and frankly, more important to society than most athletes or musicians.
MLB pitchers make $10's of millions of dollars a year, far more than most of our top talent.