alt Hacker NewsGiven there are only ~1135 billionaires in the USA right now, I'd say it's pretty much non-viable to go from sub/barely millionaire to billionaire period. But Taylor Swift doesn't seem to have murdered any kittens to get where she is nor did Rihanna so it can happen without totally selling out.
yesn't
my argument was more about becoming a billionaire by creating bringing a company to a level of success where they dominate their area of business.
I.e. not getting there by "fame" or "pure luck" (lets say you got 1/42th of early bitcoin from a "fun" project in the very early bitcoin days or similar).
Let's also for simplicity ignore that getting there by "fame" often involve tight cooperation with companies/people which don't care about ethics much. Through you might be able to separate yourself once you reach success, most times they try to make sure you can't.
And even iff you didn't compromise your ethics when becoming a billionaire this doesn't change the core argument.
That is if (as billionaire) you passively go with a push to Oligarchy you are unlikely to suffer from it. But if you don't and the Oligarchy wins, then you likely suffer a lot.
I.e. if you go with a non-emotional/non-ideology considering risk/benefit analysis passively yielding wins. Both for money and power.
In such a situation a lot of people will just go with it, no matter if billionaire or not.