“Greed,
for
lack
of
a
better
word,
is
good.”
So
said
Michael
Douglas’s
character
Gordon
Gekko
in
the
hit
1987
movie
“Wall
Street.”
The
film
(a
December
release)
deftly
articulated
the
materialistic
ethos
rampant
in
the
financial
world
of
the
rough-and-tumble
1980s.
What’s
Douglas
up
to
these
days?
Well,
still
acting,
but
some
of
his
recent
comments
to
the
press
could
give
his
turn
as
Gekko
a
run
for
its
money
in
capturing
the
moment:
“Right
now,
our
country
is
flirting
with
autocracy
[…
.]
The
disappointing
thing
is
that
politics
now
seems
to
be
for
profit.”
Although
perhaps
the
2025
comments
aren’t
quite
as
lyrical,
Douglas
has
a
point.
When
it
comes
to
rapacious
capitalism,
2025
makes
1987
look
like
a
child’s
lemonade
stand.
Let’s
peruse
a
few
of
the
ways
in
which
this
year
was
unprecedented
when
it
comes
to
greed.
Elon
Musk
Becomes
Richest
Person
In
History
With
Record-Setting
Net
Worth
This
December,
Elon
Musk
became
the
first
person
ever
worth
at
least
$600
billion.
Just
four
days
later,
Musk
became
the
first
person
worth
more
than
$700
billion.
No
other
person
has
ever
been
worth
even
a
paltry
$500
billion.
Forbes
most
recently
pegged
Musk’s
net
worth
at
$749
billion,
and
I’m
too
disgusted
to
look
again
to
see
if
that
rises
any
higher
before
my
deadline.
Musk
is
well
on
his
way
to
becoming
history’s
first
trillionaire.
Donald
Trump
Monetizes
The
Presidency
Like
Never
Before
Though
historically
many
former
presidents
had
trouble
with
it,
in
modern
times
it
is
de
rigueur
for
American
heads
of
state
to
feather
their
own
nests.
Bill
and
Hillary
Clinton,
for
example,
gave
729
paid
speeches
from
February
2001
to
May
2016
in
return
for
an
average
payout
of
$210,795
per
address,
earning
a
total
of
more
than
$153
million.
That
is
not
exactly
demonstrating
the
restraint
of
Mother
Teresa.
Still,
most
presidents
wait
until
after
their
final
term
to
really
cash
in,
and
a
haul
in
the
low
nine
figures
is
almost
quaint
by
2025
standards.
A
number
of
experts,
using
a
variety
of
methodologies,
have
calculated
how
much
Donald
Trump
has
profited
off
the
presidency.
The
calculations
with
any
credibility
put
the
figure
well
into
the
billions
of
dollars,
a
substantial
portion
attributable
to
the
president’s
various
familial
cryptocurrency
schemes.
One
very
thorough
analysis
found
that
Trump
and
his
immediate
family
had
pocketed
$3.4
billion
during
his
entire
time
in
the
White
House
as
of
August.
Another
report,
released
in
October,
found
that
President
Trump,
Melania
Trump,
and
Trump’s
two
oldest
sons
amassed
more
than
$1.8
billion
“from
selling
the
presidency”
since
his
2024
reelection
alone.
World’s
Largest
Country
Likely
Surpasses
1
Million
Casualties
In
Quest
To
Steal
Even
More
Land
Russia
is
by
far
the
largest
country
in
the
world.
It’s
almost
twice
the
size
of
the
second-largest
country,
Canada.
Russia
also
has
a
very
low
population
density.
It
does
not
need
any
more
land.
Yet,
that
hasn’t
stopped
Russia
from
instigating
and
continuing
the
largest
war
in
Europe
since
World
War
II,
simply
in
order
to
steal
land
from
its
smaller
neighbor,
Ukraine.
Unfortunately,
wars
of
territorial
expansion
are
common
throughout
history.
That
being
said,
Russia’s
unprovoked
war
against
Ukraine
is
unique
in
modernity,
and
this
year
it
likely
reached
a
bloody
milestone.
We
don’t
know
for
sure
how
many
casualties
Russia
has
suffered
so
far
in
the
war,
because
Russia
lies
constantly
about
anything
that
might
make
it
look
bad.
Western
estimates
can
also
be
all
over
the
map
(for
instance,
Trump
put
the
number
of
Russian
servicemen
killed
or
injured
during
the
war
at
600,000
in
December
2024
before
saying
Russia
had
lost
1
million
troops
during
the
war
just
one
month
later).
With
2025
starting
out
on
pace
to
be
the
war’s
deadliest
year,
more
credible
sources
indicate
that
Russia’s
casualty
count
may
have
surpassed
1
million
this
year,
with
Ukraine’s
estimated
casualties
thus
far
in
the
war
at
a
bit
less
than
half
of
that.
It’s
a
terrible
loss
of
human
life,
especially
in
pursuit
of
something
that
the
aggressor
already
has
more
of
than
it
could
ever
realistically
put
to
use.
More
To
Come?
While
these
are
a
few
of
the
most
poignant
examples
of
how
2025
was
particularly
greedy,
they
are
far
from
the
only
ones
I
could
have
chosen.
To
bastardize
a
Churchill
quote,
“Never
have
so
few
taken
so
much
from
so
many.”
If
you
care
about
the
obscenely
wealthy
getting
even
more
rich
off
the
backs
of
everyone
else,
2025
was
rough.
As
for
2026?
I
don’t
have
a
crystal
ball.
But
there
sure
doesn’t
seem
to
be
anything
standing
on
the
horizon
to
prevent
more
of
the
same.
Jonathan
Wolf
is
a
civil
litigator
and
author
of Your
Debt-Free
JD (affiliate
link).
He
has
taught
legal
writing,
written
for
a
wide
variety
of
publications,
and
made
it
both
his
business
and
his
pleasure
to
be
financially
and
scientifically
literate.
Any
views
he
expresses
are
probably
pure
gold,
but
are
nonetheless
solely
his
own
and
should
not
be
attributed
to
any
organization
with
which
he
is
affiliated.
He
wouldn’t
want
to
share
the
credit
anyway.
He
can
be
reached
at [email protected].