[chaseha]

Submission statement b/c I know Mother Jones gets pilloried as a source by some on here:

This article is a thought-provoking piece that compares today's American billionaires (many of whom have made their fortunes in tech) to the Russian oligarchs that came about post-USSR and the former US uses of the term in the pre Civil War and Gilded Age.

It's an interesting thought piece and speaks well towards how the current class of US ultra-rich got there, and spend their wealth on passion projects and chosen philanthropic endeavors while contributing to the squeeze on the lower and middle class citizens mainly due to our tax code taxing on income and not wealth, and the loopholes that allow them to pay taxes as desired.

[ProllyInfamous]

In addition to having read several billionaire authors reiterate some form of "what we GOT AWAY WITH in the 80's/90's, you couldn't dream of accomplishing anymore," a son of a Tiger Cub once got drunk and blabbed a bit too much about the insanity of money/insanity (recalled from an 80's child's POV).

I attended college on a 19th Century Robber Barron -funded scholarship, to which I am forever grateful... but there just doesn't ever seem to be a reason to concentrate so much wealth so quickly, undertaxed or not. I read this old cranky bastard's Last Will & Testament and he was just a spiteful, bitter old man that hated his entire existance.