Who Wants to Be a Trillionaire?

A satirical glance at the race to own everything, including you!

 There's a new game show in town, folks.

 It's called Who Wants to Be a Trillionaire?

 For those wanting to play, the rules are pretty simple:

Start with an emerald mine, try to convince everyone you're a self-made millionaire. After you’ve rustled up a few more bushels of cash, buy a social media platform and, voila, you’re on your way to controlling the narrative.

 Oh yes, I almost forgot. Never, ever pay taxes. For the smart ones, there are bonus points if you can launch a car into space while your worker drones pee in bottles, given the limited breaks during their 18-hour shifts!

 The competition is pretty fierce this season.

We've got tech lords, hedge fund pharaohs, and at least three contenders who genuinely believe they invented the concept of "disruption." But, let's be honest—the bookies are betting furiously on the frontrunner.

 You know him.

 Much as you try, you can't escape him. He's in most of your feeds, he’s in your car, he permeates your satellite internet, while he’s striding the hallowed halls of government.

He decided to purchase one of the world’s most influential communication platforms.  It was merely a side project to complement his ambitions for a space colony and his brain chip enterprise.

 Elon Musk (yes… that’s him) doesn't just want to be a trillionaire. He wanted to be the first trillionaire. I mean, what's the point of having more money than some countries' GDP if you can't raise aloft the trophy commemorating it?

"First Human to Hoard One Trillion Dollars" will look lovely next to "First Human to Make Twitter a lot worse."

 But here's where the game gets interesting.

 There's a horde of aspiring trillionaires surging toward the thirteen-digit finish line, ignoring the fact that something peculiar is happening at the bottom bit of the wealth pyramid—you know, where the rest of us reside.

 Americans have reached the point where they are choosing between cutting back on groceries in order to afford their insulin. Aspiring young couples are forced into solving complex equations to determine if they can afford both a child and a one-bedroom apartment. (Spoiler: they cannot.)

 Teachers are foregoing their much-needed holidays and are working summer jobs. Nurses are compelled to pick up triple shifts.

 The population is told the economy is "resilient," nay, the economy is booming, by the very people whose definition of hardship is when their ostentatious yachts need new upholstery.

 They talk about the poverty in developing nations as “just a phase they're going through.” They ignore the fact that children are dying from diseases we cured decades ago, and where families are forced to walk miles to gather water, which, in all probability, might kill them anyway.

 But fear not!

 Our newly minted billionaires are definitely aware.

They've formed foundations. They attend charitable galas looking concerned about inequality as they stride the red carpet.

What could be wrong? I mean, surely the trickle-down effect will reach sub-Saharan Africa or parts of S.E. Asia any day now.

 The thing about a trillion dollars is that at some point, it literally stops being money and morphs into something else entirely different…power and influence, and the ability to reshape reality according to your whims.

 When you're worth more than the GDP of, say, Belgium, you don't just buy things—you buy outcomes. You purchase politicians who, overnight, discover a passion for deregulation. You acquire newspapers and television conglomerates that mysteriously stop investigating your labour practices. You secure a seat at tables at high-profile charity events while the rest of us aren't even privy to the items on the menu.

 Does a trillionaire feel empowered to rule the world?

Another spoiler alert. They already do!  

 They're now working hard on rebranding strategies to shape how the world sees them. "Ruler" sounds a bit too medieval. "Benevolent disruptor of global governance" has a far nicer ring to it.

 And?

 What of those aspiring trillionaires, who try to make themselves a little more interesting than the newly minted one?

They appear on podcasts, sprouting their dialect of hustle and pseudo-philosophy.  They go on and on about "optimising their morning routines while handing out recipes for our happiness and well-being.

  They remind us constantly how hard they work and encourage the rest of us to eliminate friction.

They, of course, wake at 4 AM to meditate on abundance while their assistants beaver away on their behalf, eliminating the “friction” of answering pesky emails and other mundane tasks such as raising children.

 Oh, and don’t forget that perennial favourite, "value creation," as if they are alchemists who figured out how to extract maximum labour for minimum compensation. They genuinely believe they deserve it. That's the remarkable part!

 They've constructed the myth of merit and innovation and seem always to conclude their pompous diatribes by emphasising that they are very special while everyone else is insufficiently motivated.

That lazy single mother working three jobs? She simply hasn't optimised her mindset. The factory worker whose wages haven't kept pace with inflation since 1979?  Simple answer? He or she should have learned to code.

 So, here’s a question for our trillionaires-in-waiting:

 At what point is it enough? When you could certainly solve homelessness in America with your quarterly interest alone, is that enough?

When your wealth could eliminate malaria—would that be enough?

When you've got more money than you could spend in a thousand years, what exactly are you winning?

The answer, of course, is that it was never about the money. It’s about the score! The leaderboard. Being number one amongst players that exist only to make other rich people feel inadequate.

 So congratulations, Elon. You’ve finally hit that magic number, and we are all watching. Many of us who live in tiny rental apartments, a lot of us from inside our cars. ( where we sleep between shifts.)

And let’s bear in mind the huge populations of developing countries over which your satellites fly on their way to somewhere more profitable.

 Who wants to be a trillionaire?

 Apparently, just one guy or maybe a couple more, as they all seem to want it so badly.

 Paul v Walters is an author of several novels and a prolific travel writer. His latest offering, RITUAL, was recently launched at the International Ubud Writers and Readers Festival.