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I used to think that, too. But just because its not cash doesn't mean it doesn't still translate to wealth or power. They essentially park their money in investments, liquidate when they need to, but otherwise use their assets to extract further wealth exert further influence.
Oh, yes. But at a certain point it stops to make sense to count.
Baradar is the leader of the taliban. He can walk into any afghani home and take whatever and whomever he wants.
He has no repercussions, no need for exchanging net worth for influence. What's his net worth?
At least, where I live, he isn't allowed to take anything without a warrant. I value those things more: freedom to live, freedom to express, freedom to fart in front of the most of wealthy people.
Let others play their "maximizing net worth" game.
I think you might misunderstand me. I'm not saying that the only way to attain power is through wealth. Im pushing back against your idea that since an individuals wealth isn't cash, it's not worth accounting for. It may stop making sense to count, but only in the sense that it literally becomes incomprehensible to, and at that point it is long overdue to say it is too much. The vast power those people have is due to their net worth. Because someone else has vast power without the wealth doesn't contradict that fact.
Also I don't really see why you're tying up your freedom with billionaires, as if it is a binary choice between billionaires and personal freedom or no billionaires and tyranny. That's a bit of a strange equivalency you draw. In any case, and in practical terms, you* probably don't even have the freedom to be in the presence of the wealthiest of wealthy, let alone fart in front of them.
*assuming you are not ultra wealthy or somehow related personally to a member of the ultra rich
Edit: in other words, billionaires don't grant you your freedom -- and their freedom to extract capital and accumulate vast amounts of wealth probably has little bearing on your right to your house or personal property. In fact, they are far more equipped to seize things like your land, your data, your means of subsistence, than you are to defend them.
I'm argueing that it's a privilege that it can be accounted for. The power of wealth is limited, and doesn't extend to limiting my freedom.
In many, maybe most, historical and contemporary societies, that's not the case.
The opposite, quite in fact. I still live in a country where there's rule of law, and democracy. That shit rules 👍
I don't think it's a false equivalency: my point is, that fact that it can be accounted for is neat! What's Ghadaffi's net worth? It doesn't even make sense to ask the question, as he can sentence thousands to death on a whim.