were a millionth of the energy put into financial profit invested in more humanity-enhancing activities, we'd outgrow our collective, infantile need for hegemons.

That is the consequence of having accepted that economics is its own autonomous sphere with its own set of laws and that the whole of society must be subjected to those rules. The consequence is that the values of our society are then collapsed into one value: Return on Investment, or Equity. That single value is grossly insufficient to serve as the basis for a functioning society, though it does seem to have served very well as a pretext for the looting of that society by a parasitic elite.

Unfortunately, it seems that the host is on the verge of expiring from the effects of parasitism. What can they do when they kill the host, the society in which they developed? There is no other suitably sized victim available, especially when one considers that this is not just a problem of the USA, but of the UK and the EU as well. I don't think they are going to be able to take over China or India. This mad notion that the economy can be abstracted from the society in which it functions, if acted on for a sufficient time, will destroy the society in which operates. It may well be that most of these elites do not understand and/or do not accept the self destructive effects their actions are having.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."