If billionaires exist, they stole the money. A just market economy would not produce them.

A founder’s shares are a claim on a residual after workers and suppliers are paid. If the firm creates more value than it costs, that residual can be enormous because software and brands scale. Kaplan and Rauh’s work on American wealth is the boring version: a large share of new top wealth is in entrepreneurial equity, not a 19th-century land grant.

Consumer surplus is usually larger than the founder’s pile. People use the product because it beats the alternative. That is a market test. A just system can still tax estates, fund a floor, and break actual monopolies. Those are market-preserving repairs.

The slogan “billionaires shouldn’t exist” is a claim about the shape of the residual, not about whether a market economy is a good operating system. You can dislike yachts and still want prices, incorporation, and the right to start a firm. Confusing those is how you get a ministry of production with a poorer clerk.