There is so much grist for the mill here, I don’t know where to start. Millions of years of evolution have wired us to want more for the genetic, propagation of our species reasons. But I think there is another reason, and that is the propagation of our beliefs about the world. These two motivations together can explain even the most aberrant human behavior.
Imagine someone with more money than they could ever spend. Why do they pursue more? Genetically speaking they have access to all the food and mates they need so now it becomes a psychological need. Maybe an ego boost or some other way to feel good. One way would be to use money as a scorecard justifying all manner of “evils.” In most cases, they understand the harm they are doing, making most non-psychopaths feel bad. So now they need to justify their actions.
The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. -- The Movie, Wall Street (1987)
The Ayn Rand worldview, allows those behaving badly to feel good about their actions. They misunderstand and misstate Darwin’s natural selection as “survival of the fittest,” or that we live in a “dog-eat-dog” world so they can act accordingly. This kind of thinking leads to eugenics and eventually genocide. This is where the propagation of false beliefs come from. The psychological need to feel good about ourselves.
What Darwin intended, and what evolution is really about, is balance. Natural selection finds a balance between predator and prey, parasite and host. One does not normally or naturally wipe the other out. In today’s world, Capitalism is seen by some as a panacea and any Socialism as a slippery slope to moral decay. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of reality and why we can’t solve our poverty and inequality problems.
In my view, the solution probably looks like nature itself. Some combination of Capitalism and Socialism that can be kept in check creating a balance that benefits everyone. When the whales get too powerful, the schools of minnows should have a way of replenishing and adding to their power while the whales lose power in a dynamic self-governing way. This is how nature works, and if it works for nature we should find a way it will work for us here.