The ultra rich have, effectively, left the economy. They forgo taxable income and get what amounts to interest free loans, backed on their non-income benefits, from other rich folk, then spend that to accumulate "real" assets like property.
The result is that their imaginary, untaxed, "unrealized" money is effectively realized at an opportunity cost of normal people still participating in the schmuck economy.
It's more complicated than that, of course, and it's not exactly "free money" - the house of cards could crumble - but that's the skinny of how it works.
This is why there's so much talk of taxing unrealized gains (as one example). They're trying to remove the game and force the wealthy back into the normal economy.
The result is that their imaginary, untaxed, "unrealized" money is effectively realized at an opportunity cost of normal people still participating in the schmuck economy.
It's more complicated than that, of course, and it's not exactly "free money" - the house of cards could crumble - but that's the skinny of how it works.
This is why there's so much talk of taxing unrealized gains (as one example). They're trying to remove the game and force the wealthy back into the normal economy.