What does one need that $49 billion won't buy?

Brad Lander, an NYC Council member, read through Elizabeth Warren’s proposal to tax the rich. He tweeted this reaction:

OK, lemme get this straight. If @ewarren's wealth tax had been in place from 1982, Bezos would still have $49B, Gates $14B, Bloomberg $12B.

And we'd ALL have child care & health care. Student debt relief. 4X more Fed $ for public schools.

Can we vote now?

Will Bezos really notice the difference between $111 billion and $49 billion?

Erik Lee responded with a quote from John Steinbeck:

Socialism never took root in America because the poor there see themselves not as exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.

I reply: Maybe. It also didn’t take root because so many people wanted to make sure black people did not share in that social assistance.

Politijunkee added:

Isn't $49 billion ENOUGH? I mean, as far as quality of life goes, is there any difference between $49 and $160 billion?? What does one need that $49 billion won't buy?!?!?!

Ian Reifowitz of the Daily Kos community wrote about the latest news out of Boeing. It appears Boeing executives knew about the problems in the 737-Max plane and sold it anyway. A few hundred people died. He reviews how lobbying got Boeing into that situation.

Reifowitz mentions other corporate crimes from just this decade, perpetrated by Wells Fargo, Takata, General Motors, Volkswagen, Massey Energy, Toyota, and others.
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But this isn’t about one company: It’s about the need to rein in corporate malfeasance in general. And that’s where it connects to politics. Are Democrats perfect on this? Absolutely not, although some are far better than others (I’ve got a video below of one of the very best on these matters). But the contrast between them and Republicans overall is about as clear as it gets.

Republicans trust corporations. It’s that simple. They don’t trust regular people to be honest when seeking, for example, food stamps or Medicaid benefits. But corporations? They don’t need tough rules, oversight, and regulations to make sure they do the right thing. Republicans think such things just add unnecessary cost and reduce profits to shareholders (i.e., rich people whom the Republicans serve).
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Yeah, it is quite a supremacist thing for the GOP to say corporations – who have demonstrably killed and harmed people and are asking for looser regulations to be able to kill and harm in more ways – don’t need oversight while poor people, struggling to get by, do.