That's the case for literally everyone in our society. Can I take your money then, since you're a product of a society I contributed to?

If you make less money than the parent does, and live in the same country, than you essentially are taking their money, through their higher tax burden that pays for services (like roads and public schools and firefighters) that you almost certainly use or benefit from.

And that's a good thing! But I think higher earners should have more money taken than is currently the case. Wealth and income inequality are largely a result of luck and opportunity, not raw talent. An equitable society should find ways to mitigate those effects, which have only gotten worse in recent decades, not better.

Absolutely. In fact, I make more than most Americans ($300k household income) and I wouldn't mind more progressive tax brackets, especially if it meant we could provide our fellow countrymen with basic necessities like healthcare and continued education. My voting record reflects this sentiment. The funny thing is, Bezos has a lower tax rate than me and he's a billionaire.

Uhm yes? Thanks for understanding my point.

Thats an opportunity provided by his parents, not "society". If he owes anyone then it's them.

I’d love to have had parents who could afford to dump $1m into my fledgeling startup.

That he did proves he owes others for his success as much as his own wits and hard work.

Right, he owes his parents as established. They likely owe their parents, who owe their parents. And there were certainly others that contributed along the way may or may not have been compensated for that help. But none of these people had help from an amorphous group of "society", they had help from specific individuals.

So none of them went to public schools or used public roads or relied on a fire department. Probably none of them could look forward to social security or medicare.

Or maybe that's not correct.

Everyone on Earth owes some of their success to their parents.