Originally published (you can also watch the attached video there):
https://x.com/AilliaLink/status/1970895440125014184Several days ago, a discussion in
Monero Research Lab touched on a subject (unrelated to Monero) that I call "Free Market ≠ Meritocracy-Based Fairness." It began with:
"my point is not capitalism, which you describe. i agree with capitalism. but let it be known, the best things in life, especially in privacy, dont have their origin nor their goal in capitalism.point made is that for example jbermans work is irreplaceable, so why doesnt he ask for 300, 500 xmr per month? talent is the bottleneck eh mate :) in hardcore-capitalism world jberman asks 1000 xmr per month. but hardcore-capitalism is for wall street or shitcoin project launches. monero is and has been simply a good cause for privacy. dont we agree on that???if somebody asks for 1000 instead of 100 xmr, it will get funding anyway. but 900 xmr could have been spent on other good causes. just because the CCS get funded, doesnt mean the source of the money is limitless. there is lots of other privacy projects too. the world is in dire need. and thats coming from somebody who casually donates 5digits here.I often think in terms of "productive members of society" vs. "unproductive members of society" (unproductive like the Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet Ship B from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy :)). And the point holds true: no system (be it capitalism, communism, or otherwise) truly compensates merit-based value creators in proportion to their actual market contribution / value.
"...the best things in life, especially in privacy, dont have their origin nor their goal in capitalism": 100% there are more examples in history like the insulin or monoclonal antibodies (or many many many others) inventors who would be multi-billionaires if we lived in a pure value-creation-based world model... But more often, real value creators have never been fairly compensated (unlike pharma companies that piggybacked on their creations...) "We are fetishising a system where incentives for value creation are far from perfect." -- Rory Sutherland (quote from http://youtube.com/watch?v=r3WEezRssRw, listened while trying to learn about markets as I have to deal with one :))As someone who prob overdosed on Austrian Econ books at some point, I can't get this question (the conceptual one, not the specific MRL situation, which is more nuanced) out of my head, so I'll just "tweet it out of my head"😂. Also, my posts are never "in support" or "against" whatever point; they are random bits of a thought process... often TBC :)
TL;DR: No system, including nature, is inherently fair to its best contributors. The best approach would be for conscious individuals to voluntarily identify and contribute, on a personal level, to improving incentive systems for real value creators, aligning the free market more closely with a pure value-creation-based model.You can read the full discussion here:
https://libera.monerologs.net/monero-research-lab/20250919#c591032 
Tip AilliA 
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