How Rich Is Too Rich?
By James Quillian, Economist, Political Analyst, Natural Law
Every few years, somebody stands up and asks the wrong question. They want to know how much wealth is “too much,” as if the problem were the size of a man’s bank account instead of the size of his responsibility. Wealth itself has never been the issue. Stewardship is the issue. Always has been.
You can confiscate a man’s money, but you can’t confiscate his foolishness. You can strip him of his riches, but you can’t strip him of the habits that ruined him. And if poor stewardship is the disease, taking away the wealth is no cure at all. If it were, the poorest among us would be the wisest — and we know that isn’t true.
The tech industry has been riding high for a long time, mostly on the back of advertising dollars. For years, the public needed tech more than tech needed the public. That balance has flipped. These days, the tech giants need the population a whole lot more than the population needs them, and they’re not handling the shift with much grace.
Most people judge politicians by the labels pinned on them — conservative, liberal, moderate, centrist, reformer, outsider, insider. These labels are cheap. They are marketing tools, not measurements. If you want to understand a person or an institution, you ignore the label and look at how they actually function.