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>Wealth is a proxy for the amount of services provided to others earlier

Yeah right. How many services has Elon Musk's toddler given to others, and how much have you?

He hasn't. His father has -- obviously.

Quite a poor proxy then if he gets credit for all the good works his dad's done - enough that you could work every hour for the rest of your life and never even come close to him.

Why is it a poor proxy though? His father provided those services and passed some of the resulting wealth to his son. The quality of the proxy doesn't change depending on who's spending. Whatever the son spends, the father can't spend anymore.

Note that one of the strong drivers making people take risks, work shitty jobs, and otherwise do things that others don't want to do is exactly this -- providing for their families.

What could this mean: "Wealth is a proxy for the amount of services provided to others earlier" if not a proxy for the amount of services provided to others earlier... by the holder of the wealth?

If I can be wealthy without providing others services, then my wealth is certainly a poor proxy for how many services I have provided.

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