Comment by Gormo
2 hours ago
This is a basic concept of Public Choice Theory.
People worrying about money in politics are overemphasizing the instrumentality of money, rather than the underlying structural incentives that tend toward special interests dominating complex issues.
If money were removed from the equation, the concentrations of power, motivations to influence it, and asymmetries in those motivations will all continue to exist; political influence will just be exercised through other means, and some particular faction or class of people will still be at the sweet spot of having the greatest competence and the greatest motivation to apply those means.
A lot of people are reluctant to acknowledge it, but this is inherent to politics itself, and there is no straightforward way to fix it, other than to limit the reach of political power.
It's slightly more complex though isn't? Because the actual problem is how to limit the reach of political power while still having an effective government.
Thank you, this is a much more coherent way of saying it.