It's Immoral to Have Wealth

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez agrees with the concept that a world that allows the existence of billionaires is "immoral". From what I have been able to read this is not an uncommon belief among liberals. I would take the opposite stance and say that a system that didn't allow for the existence of billionaires would be "immoral". A system that didn't allow for billionaires would not reward those who make greater contributions. Without a system of reward for doing more, why would most people strive to do something great? The short answer is "They wouldn't!". There would be no reason for us to go to work and do our best in hopes of being recognized for a promotion or a larger raise or bonus.

This goes beyond the concept of taxing those with higher incomes to a point of saying it would be "moral" to take or steal from those that have accumulated large wealth. The ability to accumulate great wealth is protected by the Fifth Amendment to the constitution with the phrase

nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

If you read closely there is no caveat in the phrase limiting the amount of personal property a person can accumulate. It allows for those that are compensated for greater contributions to accumulate great wealth.

I think most of us recognize the benefit of having some accumulation of money, even if it's just an emergency fund in case of sickness or mechanical failure of a car or other appliance. I have believed for many years that one of the problems with our country is that we don't save enough money. When I was younger I tried to save a little bit of money each month. Starting out is was maybe $10 or $20 a month, I was certainly never made it to be a billionaire but I was gradually able to increase this over time.

My question came down to this: How much wealth accumulation do this people believe is too much? At what point do these people believe my efforts to accumulate a little wealth has become immoral?

When we were trying to save the $10 or $20 a month my ex-wife and I didn't go out to eat in restaurants. We eventually got to the point we would order pizza once a month but the rest of the time we cooked our own dinner. Believe me, my rigid stance on this subject did cause some strife in our marriage but eventually my ex-wife came around to my way of thinking. I maintained this type of sacrifice always living below my means while watching friends and family in my mind squander money with new cars or expensive vacations. Why buy a new car when one 3 to 5 years old can provide the same functionality. Even today I am still amazed that people will pay someone to cut their lawns or other tasks around the house and then buy a gym membership to get some exercise. If you want exercise, what's wrong with pushing a lawn mower?

After checking on the internet, I was unable to find a definition of what level wealth became immoral. The articles I read eventually used this as a justification for taxing those with high incomes at higher rates. Wealth and income are two different things. Income is what you are paid for the work you do, wealth comes from not spending all of that income. It's not hard to find people that have made a great deal of money as income in their lives that are now living lives of poverty. Today, I'm not a millionaire and certainly not a billionaire but I don't have to worry about having enough wealth to make it through those tough times that life can throw at you. Does that make me immoral?

According to the article Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Net Worth Is Higher Than You Think, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez currently has a net worth of around $0. She does have $7000 roughly in savings and her new job in the House of Representatives pays her $174,000 per year. Since the median 29 year old has only $2430 in savings, shouldn't she be giving some of this money away to help others? I also doubt there are many other 29 year olds making a salary of $174k. The article goes on to point out that during her first year in the house Ms. Ocasio-Cortez could boost her net worth by $88,000 and if she maintains her spending habits she could be a millionaire by the time she is 38 years old.

Since Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is a public figure her net worth can be tracked over her career. It will be interesting to see if she maintains the values she talks about or will she join the ranks of the immoral rich people. It's easy to talk about confiscating the money of the wealthy when it's other people's money you're going after.