I will agree there are so many ways to rationalize the distribution of wealth. I am going to regurgitate some well known sources just to get the encompassing concept across.
I will start with one statistic for the total wealth of the world and then stay focused on the United States of America.
As of January 2016, 62 people own as much wealth as 1/2 the world’s population own. How this looks as a number: 62 out of 3,500,000,000. It was 388 in 2010 and dropped to 80 in 2014.
From Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_inequality_in_the_United_States (noting other sources), in 2014 the bottom 80% of the population owned 7% of the wealth of the United States, the top 1% owned 40%, and the top 20% owned 93%.
In 2011 the top 400 wealthiest Americans own as much as 1/2 of the population of the United States owns. How this looks as a number: 400 out of 156,000,000.
A 2014 Harvard Study noted America’s wealth gap unsustainable http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-harvard-survey-idUSKBN0H30ZN20140908.
We have the results of how our version of a capitalistic economy accumulates wealth in the hands of a very few. If the trend continues (and there’s no reason to believe it won’t as it doesn’t show signs of reversing itself), then the outcome is as close to a Plutocracy or even a Kleptocracy as you can get. These are some of the very reasons our founding fathers parted with England.