This is what happens when Capitalism is not regulated or it is poorly regulated. It can happen with any economic system because of the presence and power of human greed. You see in China, which is nominally Communist, or in the Soviet Union, which was nominally Communist, that the Party leaders live much much better lives than the rest of the people.
This is not the first time we have seen something like this in the United States either. The Guilded Age and the Roaring 20's were examples of times where wealthy Capitalists gained access to government and made rules that favored them. The railroads and large cattle ranchers used the US Army to exterminate Native Americans for their profit. Railroads exploited Irish, Chinese, and Mexican Immigrants. The US Marines were all over Central America in the 1900's clearing a path for fruit companies to exploit labor and resources.
When a small group of men (yes usually men, and White) are allowed to accumulate such an amount of money, that they can afford to buy politicians, then society suffers. Capitalism left without strict regulation, will turn into that system every time. The industrialists during the Guilded Age thought that they could silence the popular Teddy Roosevelt by making him McKinley's vice president, which was a nothing post at the time. Well McKinley got shot and TR became President. When Roosevelt began trust busting and using government authority to set aside lands for public use, the industrialists hated him. They wanted him gone! Same with FDR, who used government authority to reign in the excesses of Capitalism to stave of a full blown Socialist or Communist Revolution in the US. The wealthy were so pissed off that they planned to stage a coup.
The wealthy got smarter and they got PR since the 1970's and started selling bullshit directly to the people. Now many are convinced that cutting taxes on the wealthy is somehow going to benefit them. That holding workers' wages down is somehow going to benefit them. That everything is the fault of poor immigrants trying to scratch out a living, rather than the wealthiest people who actually have the power to shape society. You have Larry Kudlow and the GOP STILL out there pushing "trickle down", which has been debunked in over 50 years of research.
Calling it Vulture, or Crony or anything else but just plain unregulated Capitalism, in my opinion, just allows people to argue that the system is fine, it is just some aberration. Nope, left without strict and ongoing regulation, this is what Capitalism becomes, every time.
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