Yep, it just was better regulated in the recent past. It wasnt always much better, the great depression era was arguably worse. It only took 20 years and a world war to pull us out.
Yes! There is this Buddhist saying, supposedly some 2,500 years back, "Even if a whole mountain were made of gold, not double that would be enough to satisfy one person."
You can trace unsatisfied greed in American gazillionaires all the way back to Rockefeller. Before that, you can trace it to Kings, Queens, Emperors, Conquerors. Only external circumstances, societal structures/cultures/etc, keep the greed in check. As soon as we were out of subsistence living, we started collecting, often times just for the sake of collections, sometimes other people's great misery be damned.
And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers' money, and overthrew the tables; And said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence; make not my Father's house a house of merchandise.
I'm reminded of a quote from some animated(?) movie that I can't recall. It was along the lines of "the same as yesterday, and the day before that and the day before that" in a dejected tone.
If anybody could help me figure out what that was, it would be much appreciated.
Edit: It was A Nightmare Before Christmas. My mind replaced "year before that" with "day before that".