That has nothing to do with America or HN. Everywhere I've went I've seen the same thing: vast majority of people see no other value than financial, in general. It shapes how they think, who they hang out with and what their "values" are. Money comes first, and then everything is rationalized later.

For example, if a rich person does activity X and a poor person does the same, equivalent activity X, it can happen (and it does happen) that they say that the poor person is an idiot while the rich person is a genius. For the same exact thing.

Rich people know this. They know they are buying everything around them, including people. None of the rich people I know are naive in the sense that they think are that funny, interesting, intelligent or attractive, especially to females. The things that I've seen rich people get away with, I guarantee, 99% of HN will not believe. Probably me too, if I didn't witness it. Not talking about crimes here (although that happens, too). Just social things.

It's all a game and everyone involved knows exactly how everything is setup, but for some reason, we look the other way and if we say anything like this in real life, we would be thought of as "bitter" or jealous or something.

Money is indisputably important, but the best marker of intelligence that I have consistently seen is the right attitude and appreciation of money.

And I am saying this as someone well off, who will most probably never have any financial issues in life. So this is not "bitterness" or envy of the rich or something.