> This is a dishonest piece. [...] If you think this game through, you'll still end up with super wealthy outliers and bankruptcies, but the players in the game actually have some agency.
You basically admitted that the zero sum property has little bearing on the outcomes we're scrutinizing here, and so the argument is ultimately the same. I'm not sure how the piece is dishonest simply because it dispenses with an apparently irrelevant premise.
Honestly, this was a good observation that forced me to think more deeply about why the distinction matters.
I disagree that it's irrelevant. If the game is zero sum, the winners must succeed at the expense of everyone else. The game mechanics themselves produce unfair outcomes since nobody has any agency in their own outcome. Therefore, as this piece argues, the rules should be changed.
On the other hand, my example provides an alternative explanation for wealth inequality in which risk taking and inequality are inextricably linked. In my game, nobody loses because someone else won.
Far fewer people would find these game mechanics unfair, even though the final distribution of wealth is the same. It is not obvious that the rules should be changed.
I could adjust my game mechanics to make them look even more like the real world (as I see it): Every time someone takes a risk and wins, the non-bet reward should go up by a penny (e.g. from $0.30 to $0.31). In that situation, one would expect all the players to encourage risk taking because they know it benefits everyone whether they're taking risks or not. They might even conclude that the risk takers should have a chance at being wealthier than them because of these effects.
Using the zero-sum game leads the reader to a conclusion based on a false premise and I feel that was intellectually dishonest.
Note: one can still argue that the rules should be changed because wealth inequality itself is a problem, but that's not what this article is doing. It's arguing it based on the fictional rules.
You basically admitted that the zero sum property has little bearing on the outcomes we're scrutinizing here, and so the argument is ultimately the same. I'm not sure how the piece is dishonest simply because it dispenses with an apparently irrelevant premise.