Among the worst aspects of our New Gilded Age is a revival - of a sorts - of the old Gospel of Wealth. The Gospel of Wealth was a pernicious idea that lay at the heart of much of the Gilded Age: namely that wealth was a sign of God's favor. If you were rich, it was a sign that you were superior to other people.
Today, this idea that wealth is a signifier of personal (as opposed to material) worth is most seen the cult around certain tech bros, most obviously Elon Musk. Musk is now so far off the rails that he's amplifying anti-Semitism, as the value of Twitter/X collapses. Is Musk the same level of gibbering moron that Trump is? No. But he's not a genius ubermensch either.
I suppose there's a parallel somewhere with all the tech bros literally stuck in the mud at Burning Man, but I'm a bit too tired to try and suss that our this morning. Something about the libertarianism of the tech bros who trek to Burning Man and then whine when it rains and the agents of the state can't get them out is just <chef's kiss>.
The Gilded Age Gospel of Wealth came with it a certain obligation to use your wealth for the public good. Too often this came in the form of noblesse oblige stuff like funding art museums and colleges, but sometimes there was actual charitable work being done. I have my doubts about the new generation of plutocrats. Gates has obvious done a lot, but this new generation of tech moguls seem unlikely to improve the civic life of the world.
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