LeBron James has, between playing basketball and endorsing things, earned a billion dollars. What bad thing did he do, other than losing the finals a few times?
If she meant "impossible" completely literally, then she is wrong.
"No I didn't mean this [virtuous example]. I meant the vast majority of [unnamed nefarious actors] which I don't need to elaborate about as their existence is obvious."
Once you say it's just hyperbole and you don't mean it literally, then the only way to prove it is a statistical argument.
"The overwhelmingly share of company founders and companies are bad and don't earn their money." is a big claim that requires more than vibes.
What counts as 'doing something bad' and 'cheating' clearly is subjective. I suspect Graham's opinion on the behaviour of a Zuckerberg or a Musk would be a little more flattering than mine.
I see large companies selling things they ought not sell (eg: Meta glasses, Tesla FSD) and making malevolent decisions (eg: Google deprioritising search content, Amazon hijacking product searches). Those things probably bother Graham too, but I reckon I consider them more evil than he, since I have less reverence for the 'invisible hand of the market'
Whether my comments constitute a motte-and-bailey depends on whether a reasonable person would assume the "impossible to earn a billion dollars" statement to be hyperbole.
It’s an industry of low-grade exploitation, generating products that people mostly don’t need. It’s bizarre. It fits squarely into the category AOC is trying to define here.
In another world, LeBron is still a millionaire, getting a nice $1M a year. The rest, a mere $39M, which in Paul Graham terms is just a couple months from turning into a billion, goes to the hopeless kids actually churning out the god damn shoes.
LeBron did nothing wrong. The system is this corrupt.
It was made by someone who cannot afford healthy food.
Meritocracy my hairy ass.