Read the article Kleptocracy in America, [theatlantic.com]. All this is covered. A big part of the problem, as I see it, is that everyone wants kids and they, naturally, want their kids to succeed. Often they will do anything for their kids to succeed and the recent college bribery scandals only showed the tip of the iceberg. My late partner’s son had 3 kids, boom, boom, boom and the first 2 were by caesarean (she did not want to go through the discomforts of labor). My partner told her son life would be really hard for his kids and he agreed BUT both parents are successful doctors and he told his mom they will provide for their kids future (meaning lots of money). People often don’t care about others or their kids and have no problem with doing whatever they can for their kids. It has now become a vicious cycle. The more the wealthy keep their wealth from society the worse things get and the more they feel the need to hide even more. A previous “Atlantic” article "The Birth of a New Aristocracy" [theatlantic.com] shows this issue.

Pass a financial reform law? How long have we been saying that and where has it gotten us? I see this as just more social technological fixes but what is needed is a drastic change in how the society works and thinks. Unfortunately, social changes are one of the slowest things to evolve. All these things we have been talking about for decades and they have only gotten worse. 25 years ago I attended a session from a couple who had written a book of where we were headed. The bottom line was that evolution tends toward complexity and people's job areas would get more and more complex so people would have to specialize. That often meant they only saw a fraction of a field and lost sight of the bigger picture. The worst item involved jobs. More and more of us meant a huge emphasis on creating jobs. Screw the environment it is the economy that must be emphasized and that is where we are today and simple fixes won’t and haven’t worked. Talk about gerrymandering; it is on the Supreme Courts hands the same Supreme Court that passed ‘Citizens United’!