I think of it a bit like bumper bowling: let's make sure nobody is throwing gutter balls. We don't need to make sure everyone bowls a perfect (or even good) game.

Like, folks ought to have reasonable access to healthy food, primary education, basic healthcare, and a place to live. We provide that to prisoners. And maaaaaybe if we need additional funding for those things for the general public, we can look into adding a few new tax brackets and closing some loopholes for the "my wealth makes most of my income" set. Rising tides that lift all boats are good and all, but theirs have been lifted so much higher for so much longer that they aren't really pulling their weight anymore.

And the social contract needs to be pegged to trying hard. If you work a job, regardless of what it is, it ought to provide for a better quality of life than merely existing. It doesn't mean the fry cook at McDonald's needs a government mandate to make what the neurosurgeon does.

This whole extremist equity position that is, basically, "burn everything down and we can have equal access to the ashes" that you see all over reddit and Twitter is not the way forward.