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Is it even possible to be a billionaire without exploiting others?

Why wouldn't it be? Wealth is created, and if you can create a billion dollars in wealth, then so be it.

Even if so, is it right that you can be a billionaire while there are more empty homes each night in the US than the homeless population?

Depends on what you mean by "right". Is that a troubling, even disturbing situation? Yes, I would find it to be so. But is any particular billionaire (or any other particular individual at all) somehow obligated to fix the homelessness problem? No.

Is it right that you can safely eat anything you like while others have to make sacrifices and choices because of political cuts to SNAP? The answer is clearly no.

I would disagree, again with the caveat that it depends on what you mean by "right". I think I would rank that situation as "unfortunate", and I think we all wish the rich would do more to help the less fortunate. I know when I was dirt-poor, living below the poverty line, I resented the rich a bit, so I get this mindset. But as I've moved through life and seen what hard-work and determination can accomplish, and become more comfortable in my own skin, I find that I no longer cherish the idea of handouts greatly, except for the real edge cases: People who literally cannot fend for themselves - the elderly, children, people who are physically or mentally disabled, etc.

In this way, pursuing money for wealth's sake is unethical.

I guess this also depends on how you define unethical. Is a really rich person who does nothing to help the less fortunate a huge asshole? Arguably, yes. But is that the same thing as behaving unethically? I wouldn't say so. But I expect we have fundamentally differing worldviews on some basic issues, so I'm betting we'll always disagree on this.

>>>"But is any particular billionaire (or any other particular individual at all) somehow obligated to fix the homelessness problem? No."

As you get wealthier, your ability to affect society expands. I'd argue that, in the same way one can feel responsible for members of your family, society is your larger family. Humanity, an even larger one. Perhaps a wealthier individual should feel as though more of society is their 'family' as he/she gets wealthier — and treat them as kin.

Instead, what you often find is self-involved individuals becoming more and more distant from their society as they get wealthier (large households with gigantic yards, vacation homes, remote travel).

You totally ignore the exploitation part...

You can't just "create wealth" like magic. You have to do something to build wealth. and for billions of dollars you either have to do a great deal of something or do it to an incredible degree more successfully than someone else. The question is are you going to screw over someone else (or even a large group of people) to make that happen in a society where the next biggest fish probably has little compunction about doing so.

Its a rhetorical and philosophical question really, but your answer that you can create wealth so you don't have to exploit anyone, isn't even a thoughtful attempt at an answer. The ideas don't even touch each other.

>>One of the key points of this essay is that making more money doesn't necessarily improve one's quality of life.

No, actually the article says addictive preference towards money doesn't improve quality of life. Not having lots of money. Having lots of money nearly undoubtedly increases your quality of life.

>>There are levels of income that are wholly satisfactory for an individual's life that still classify that person as not rich.

Higher the levels go better the things get.

By QOL here we're talking about happiness. After a certain point (once you have the things you want & don't have to worry about things) more money doesn't bring more happiness. Hedonistic adaptation crushes this down further.

That is an interesting question about being a billionaire without exploiting anyone. I'm genuinely curious about that.

Not that I think being a Billionaire automatically makes you an asshole. I'm just curious if that is possible just from a logistical standpoint. Somewhere along the line someone gets screwed right?

> billionaire without exploiting anyone.

Some social science guys would say that this is true for every business - since you're operating in an exploiting system(capitalism) ,someone is bound to get exploited.

Old Soviet joke:

Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under socialism, it's the other way around.

There are various ways to be a billionaire without exploiting. Maybe the cleanest is if you make something that people think is worth that eg JK Rowling and the Potter stuff. Although she's given some to charity.

That is an interesting one I hadn't thought of. Artists creating art (or other creative works) and making it big. Good one! It doesn't all have to happen as a cut throat business transaction sort of thing.

>>That is an interesting question about being a billionaire without exploiting anyone.

That question actually has deep philosophical implications. I think the net content of evil and good has to be cancel out at a social level completely for the society to go in total social harmony.

So there has to be in some way a balance of evil and good in any society for it even to survive.

I don't think it's possible. We live in a finite world. All my wealth comes from someone else's poverty.

There is more per-capita wealth today then there was 1000 years ago. This is despite there being far more people today than there was 1000 years ago. Therefore it is possible to increase the total wealth in the world.

That's true and false at the same time.

False because, wealth can be added to any economy every time you build/sell some thing other people want.

True because, though wealth can be added over a period of time at any given time the current net circulation is still a static constant number.

Depends how you define "wealth". If by "wealth" you mean "money", then more money can be printed (not that you'd want to do this). If by "wealth" you mean goods or services, more of those can be produced. I'm not really sure there's any definition of "wealth" that's zero-sum, except maybe "land".

Some forms of wealth we can produce more of: food, clothes, shelter, electronic doodads.

Some we can't: land (including natural resources), social status, political power.

We should aim for a society that produces plenty of the first type of wealth, and aims for fair distribution of the second.