Disagree about the billionaire bit. Accumulates too much power too narrowly. Then one can subvert the market and rule of law. It seems the line lies somewhere between a hundred million and billion dollars at the current value of a dollar.
I am happy and eager to make exceptions on a case by case basis if that billion dollars have been made in exchange of tangible goods and services.
Why being tangiable so important? E.g. a billionare made it on physical music CD cs one made it on music streaming? As long as it's legal, why prioritize physical form?
Ignoring this aspect of the way the world works is living in a fantasy world, no less fantastic than a communist utopia.
Oh! I chose my word poorly. Streaming is very much "tangible" in the sense I had intended. "No regret transaction" is perhaps a better term than tangible, for the notion I am trying poorly to capture.
Let's take Walter Bright. I would love him to be a billionaire if he isn't one already. He made many delightful "goods", (to entertain oneself with and also to pay one's bills writing programs in a language so pleasant *). No party in the transaction would regret such a transaction, even in hindsight.
There are legal ways to accumulate wealth, however, without exchanging any goods and services. For example, HFT (ought to be called low latency rather than high frequency), speculation on the stock marketd. Derivative markets, for example, are zero sum, for one to win someone else has to lose. The wealth accumulated by such means has not been created, merely redistributed.
* Wish more companies used D though, so that it's actually feasible to earn your keep writing in D.
Sure, HTF is zero sum. I just think that focus on it is excessive. 99.9% of businesses are not. Regret would be nice to include in consideration but I doubt one can reliably measure it in practice
Also, disagree on options and futures market. They do provide important economoc function of price discovery and insurance against risk
"The derivatives market is, in a word, gigantic—often estimated at over $1 quadrillion". The stock market would be puny in comparison. This is quite well known so was quite surprised by your objection.
https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/052715/how-big-deri...
The derivatives market is much larger than the stock market, both in sheer trading volume and total face value. While global stock markets represent a total value of roughly \(\$120\) trillion, the estimated notional value of the global derivatives market easily exceeds \(\$500\) trillion to \(\$1\) quadrillion.
https://share.google/aimode/EAEGnOouA5dvj9leC
Derivative markets are necessary for price discovery but when they tower over in volume over the market whose prices it was supposed to discover it is serving a purpose that towers over its justified/motivating purpose.