“They keep telling us to innovate,” she says. “But how do you innovate a nap schedule?”
In some corners of the left, the solution is simple: tax the rich. But revenue alone doesn’t rewire a system that’s been redesigned to obey wealth. What’s needed is unwinding concentrated control. Disempowerment of the owners of pass-through power. Clear lines between those who write policy and those who profit from its loopholes.
That means severing the feed line: no more blank checks from industries to their regulators. No more revolving doors between lobby firms and Senate staffs. No more campaign auctions dressed up as summits. If a firm’s market share swallows its rivals, we don’t applaud—we investigate. In real time, on public record, before the damage is done.
It also means cultural honesty. Acknowledging that wealth is not the same as wisdom. That capital accumulation is not a substitute for civic vision. That just because someone built an app doesn’t mean they should help run the country.
Anna Li still keeps the doors open. She cuts her own hours, rotates toys to hide the shrinking budget, and tells the kids that crackers count as lunch.
“We make it work,” she says. “Because we have to.”
But when the billionaire calls and the labor plank disappears, what’s really vanishing is the idea that government belongs to the governed.
Not to the donors. Not to the markets. Not to those who believe taxes are theft but contracts are sacred.
And certainly not to anyone who thought “The Billionaire” needed no further explanation—because in a democracy, even billionaires should need a name.
Bibliography
1. Acemoglu, Daron. Quoted in The Economist. May 2024.
2. A leading MIT economist warns that unchecked wealth concentration is undermining the foundations of liberal democracy.
3. Coburn, Tom. Federal Payments to Millionaires: A Report on Taxpayer-Funded Subsidies. U.S. Senate Report, 2011.
4. This Senate report details how federal subsidies disproportionately benefit millionaires, exposing structural favoritism in government spending.
5. Congressional Budget Office. Analysis of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, 2024.
6. A nonpartisan analysis showing how the proposed legislation would have disproportionately rewarded high-income investors at public cost.
7. Disney, Abigail. “Tax Me, Please.” Interview by PBS Frontline, 2023.