Because we don’t need to glorify pursuits that aren’t advancing society.

I’d rather we had another newly minted billionaire employing 60k people with middle class jobs than one more man who helps old ladies cross the street for free.

It's clear we have very different ideas about what "advancing society" is. I tend to think that people like MLK are the ones that advance society. The man helping old ladies cross the street is advancing society. Successful businesses advance the economy.

A billionaire who employs 60k people hasn't done anything altruistic. It's a business, not a charity. The skills and time of those 60k people made the billionaire a billionaire. Why would I laud either side in a fair exchange?

I might praise the skill and foresight of the billionaire. I might praise the skill and hard work of the workers. But neither is "advancing society". They're pursuing their own interests.

Because just keeping the economy going is advancing society. It’s the base that keeps all of the researchers fed, clothed, warmed, etc. Anyone contributing to keeping that functioning is critical.

The only people who don’t care about the economy are ones who haven’t lived through a truly bad one.

It’s not some thing that just happens in a vacuum to make people rich. It’s what drives 99% of the production of all goods and services in the US. The endowments for all of our top research universities depend on the economy, etc etc.

You call it “just a business transaction”, but employing 60k people with good paying jobs in a financially sustainable way is incredible because it means they are producing more than the value of all of those salaries to the wider society. Producing a surplus is how we advance.

You can argue that some businesses are leeches because externalities or whatever, but that can be fixed with taxation. When it comes down to it we need to operate at break even or a surplus as a society or we are fucked.