Your freedom is pretty narrow in scope though. Amazon has so much market power, and regulators are so weakened that instead of the government setting the boundaries, billionaires and PE are with financial weapons. Yeah, you can go pop a Shopify store open whenever you want, but if you want to succeed you are going to see a lot of Bezos-built barriers to climb.

Further, do we have "greater access to markets" and is that desirable, when those markets are largely selling the same things, and what variety exists usually also comes with questionable reliability/quality? How does that greater market access affect the ability of average Americans to start and successfully operate a small business when products are so easily copied and drop shipped from Asia?

The best chance at a reliable retirement and an equal or better life for your kids goes through a stable, broadly wealthy country. Inequality and corruption have toppled more ancient regimes than the US Republic, and all of your money exists in the form of "the full faith and credit" of the Republic. Your interests are aligned with the article.

> but if you want to succeed you are going to see a lot of Bezos-built barriers to climb.

Like what, though? How is Amazon unfairly stopping indie stores from succeeding?

Lots of ways. Directly, such as - https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-scooped-up-data-from-its.... It's a marketplace for laundering counterfeit and knockoff goods, harming the interests of legitimate businesses. Also indirectly by creating market pressures around logistics, pricing, SEO, and paid advertising that make it very difficult for a small operator to succeed against. A small business can struggle against a vertically integrated giant like Amazon, but only a very small portion will succeed to any degree.

Moreover, it's incredibly frustrating, as a merchant, dealing with an unregulated private bureaucracy like Amazon's. I know plenty of merchants who have had their inventory mixed with counterfeit competitors, received arbitrary account bans (including having funds frozen), and had to spend large amount of cash to comply with new policies that they invent with little warning.

None of those are barriers. If you want to live on the amazon platform, you end up being a serf on their platform. That's a given.

If you want to start a small business to compete with amazon, then of course their logistics, pricing and SEO is better than you. That's like saying that you want to start a garage car manufacturing plant, but you are out-competed by automanufacturer's investment in robotization and automation, and streamlined inventory management.

That's not a 'barrier' per se - it's the point of amazon. As a small operator, if you do not have a value proposition, you don't have the right to exist.

So are the barriers to entry obvious or nonexistent? Because you described both. Not only are they barriers, but vertically integrated monopolies have been illegal for a century. If erecting economic moats is the entire point of Amazon like you said, then it’s obvious they need to be broken up.

You really don’t think small, independent merchants are affected by Amazon’s 2 day delivery or taking back any return? That’s naive.

>The main barriers to me personally are not billionares, but myself and my goals.

I believe this feeling is misguided and here is why. You would be richer today if there was more equality. But instead you are held back by the same forces that those at the bottom 50% are.

Even the rich managerial and technocratic class that you and I are part of (upper middle class) are poorer than we would be if it was more equal.

So in other words, you have been screwed too by the system. But because you don't feel screwed (despite evidence that you have been) is why it continues to keep going.

Maybe they are trying to screw you but it still on you to fight that.

I don't feel like "inequality" is a problem in and of itself. I don't care that there are a lot of people with a lot more money than me.

I would get upset if they don't make a fair contribution to running and maintaining our society.

I get upset when I read that there are some very large organizations that don't pay tax.

I get upset when our government hands out bailouts.

I get upset when polluters don't pay to clean up their own mess.

I get upset when wealthy people use their wealth to exercise power and manipulate public opinion, so that my opinions are in the minority. :)

> I don't feel like "inequality" is a problem in and of itself.

That's because it doesn't effect you.

You don't have to face death because you can afford insulin or food or housing.

The lack of insulin, food, and housing is the problem. That really has nothing to do with how much money somebody else has. You could give everybody fee insulin, food and housing and not take anything away from the 1%. We the 99% simply choose not to.

I'm more or less in the same situation as you, although relatively early in my career. I would urge you to try and look a little broader at what situations people even just below "middle class" are facing nowadays.

From a personal finance perspective, I'm aligned with you. I shovel my money into my 401k and index funds, and still have plenty left over to survive and buy things I want and need. By doing so, I can participate just a tiny bit on the finance side of capital and take in a bit of the upside.

>I understand those below the poverty line may not have the luxury of opening a IRA, stock account, etc. or immediately starting their own online business.

It's not just people below the poverty line. The vast majority of Americans, especially younger ones, are not making enough to substantially invest or feel secure financially. If someone does start their own business (an incredibly difficult venture), it will be at their own risk, with much to lose. Dabbling in side projects is a luxury, and I don't think it's reasonable to expect people who are more overworked and less financially stable than you or I to realistically use that as a way to lift themselves up. It's also not really a solution that scales, in my opinion. You can't expect everyone to start their own side hustle. Most businesses fail. Some lose money for years until eventually breaking even. Obviously, more opportunity is good, and I want to see people succeeding in starting their own businesses and innovating, but isn't having financial and social safety the biggest factor in encouraging that?

>Make this article relevant to a middle-class person on track to retire in their 60s, who tinkers on weekends with a few startup ideas, and generally thinks their kids will be better off if they continue to have the same access to education, business and investing. Why should that person be personally concerned about income inequality?

I'll take a stab at this from a couple angles. First off, you either care or you don't. Like you said, you're doing fine. I'm doing fine. I don't think anyone really owes you an explanation to make you care, because you don't have to. But I have friends who graduated at the same time as me who aren't doing great. They're working way harder at whatever blue collar job they could find than I ever did, for less money. Mental health isn't great. I'm not particularly different from them, other than I happened to like computer science as a kid, and my brain is sufficiently configured to churn out some code for an employer for 8 hours a day. I don't think I could look them in the eye and suggest that they just invest more, or consider starting their own business, or try online learning, when they're already down. I never did any of that.

The other side of it is that the middle class is still significantly more aligned politically and financially in their interests with the rest of the population than the 1%. I'm making a lot of money, but one bad trip to the hospital would still bankrupt me. I still worry about rent. How about everyone else who is worse off than me? The truly wealthy are playing a fundamentally different game than the rest of us, however you feel about that. One interesting aspect of the recent push for more progressive policies is that much of it is being driven by middle class white collar workers, and not blue collar. I see it as a sign of the increasing income/wealth inequality trending over the last several decades. The middle class has typically been 'placated' by being able to live a decent living, but even they're feeling the squeeze now.

I hope that was somewhat coherent and didn't come off as too combative. I really just want to convey my personal experience and how it's different from yours.

Thanks - I do think that's coherent and not combative at all, and appreciate hearing a similar, but different experience. I think the crux of where I would disagree is on how hard it is to start a business and/or invest. Growing up, I saw my dad go from lower middle class house painter to upper middle class IT work by taking night classes and self-teaching, so that informs my experience. I could see less fortunate middle class stories having a less optimistic view. I see that's subjective somewhat. But I think I'm on solid ground to say it's never been easier or cheaper, especially for a definition of "business" that includes 10-50k/year side projects to supplement a day job.

Similar with investing. Robinhood, et al have huge issues for sure (as we recently learned), but anybody can dollar-cost-average into some index funds and do better on average than sticking cash in the bank.

It's not so much that I don't _care_ about others less fortunate (I really do, and put my money where my mouth is on that). But I also genuinely think that one big way to help people is to help them have successful small businesses and invest, and encourage a mentality of self-education. I have definitely had that conversation with less financially stable peers. I don't push it on them, but if they are interested, we do brainstorm business ideas and talk about next steps, investing philosophy, interesting books and sites, etc.