Gawker writer Hamilton Nolan thinks that everything is terrible and everybody is horrible. He’s probably right. In his post “Do the ‘Good Rich’ Exist?” Nolan references a great 2006 essay by philosopher Peter Singer and a new book by historian Robert F. Dalzell to consider if the super-rich who give away great wealth while still in possession of even greater wealth are actually deserving of our praise. An excerpt:

“The purpose of this discussion is not to impugn the character of billionaires. It is to ask: What is the cost to society of the perception that we should be grateful to these wealthy men for their generosity? The assumptions implicit in that view are A) that the wealthy are fully entitled to their money because they earned it on the basis of their own talents, and B) that the need for society and its laws to protect the entitlement of the rich to their own wealth outweighs the aggregate societal needs that could be cured or ameliorated by that wealth (poverty, disease, etc.). Gratitude towards the great philanthropists is based on the assumption that they are not and should not be expected to give their wealth back to the world; it is based on the assumption that the normal, default, acceptable behavior for the very wealthy is to hoard most of their wealth and put it solely to their own use. It is a view in which society grovels at the feet of great men who have succeeded where the rest of us have failed.

Warren Buffett himself has attributed most of his success to the society he lives in—its governmental protections, its rule of law, its fair and transparent markets, its educational system, and so on. The wise rich (and anyone realistic about the role of chance in the outcomes of all of our lives) recognize that personal talent is but one minor ingredient of vast success. If society is responsible for the vast majority of the success of the rich, then returning the vast majority of that wealth back to society is the least that the rich can do. (Really, it’s the least, considering the fact that they would still be left incredibly wealthy.) This level of giving back to the society that spawned them should be expected of the rich. Yes, society owes them its gratitude—the same gratitude that it owes you for paying your taxes, and volunteering, and making your annual donation to UNICEF. The same gratitude, regardless of the number of zeroes on the check. The gratitude that comes when someone does a good thing that they are expected to do. The gratitude you get for fulfilling your role as a responsible member of society.

To the extent that we should be grateful to the great philanthropists, we should be grateful to them for fulfilling a duty. And to the extent that that duty is to be truly generous, it is a duty that none of them have fulfilled.”