Money comes with influence. If you're middle class you can go to your senator's favorite bar, act and dress like you belong there, and have a conversation with him without the mediation of staffers and in a context where he's kindly disposed. If that's not your scene you'll need to be a little manipulative and burn a thousand bucks or so on the right clothes and haircut, but it's not out of reach for a lot of us. If you're rich you make big campaign donations to several congresscritters, and you don't have to be subtle. If you're poor you don't have either option.I continue to struggle to understand the attention given to relative measures of well-being compared to absolute measures of well-being.
I agree, political corruption is a problem. I think we should talk about why political mechanisms lead to bad outcomes, how the wealthy and connected can manipulate those with political power to their own advantage, and how politicians benefit by such deals. Yet income diversity is typically portrayed as inherently evil. The villain is usually the wealthy CEO, who provides voluntary opportunities for people of all income levels to earn and spend. It is rarely the successful athlete or entertainer, who contributes just as much to inequality by providing voluntary opportunities for people of all income levels to be entertained. Invariably the solution to the inequality "problem" is to give more power to politicians.