B6 EZ BD THE WASHINGTON POST.SUNDAY, MARCH 6 , 2022
mean they are simple. Checkers alone has
500,995,484,682,338,627,639 different posi-
tions. The number of positions for the infi-
nitely more complex Go is so immense that it
has 171 digits. For comparison, Roeder tells us
that the number of atoms in the entire
universe is a number that is 80 digits long.
Yet as daunting as these numbers are,
adding an element of chance is the real game
changer (pardon the pun). Computers lose
their advantage over humans when they play
a completely random game like rock, paper,
scissors. In backgammon, poker and Scrab-
ble, the roll of the dice, or the draw of a card or
a tile, introduces a level of luck that makes it
exponentially harder for humans or comput-
ers to predict the next move. It is simply not
feasible (for now) to use raw computing
power to muscle through enormous decision
tree branches and pick the best options.
Machines can tackle aspects of the game, but
they can’t solve it.
This forces scientists to find new ways to
harness computing’s tremendous potential.
For backgammon, IBM researcher Gerald
Tesauro created a neural networking program
that looked instead for patterns, mimicking
human learning. Not only did TD-Gammon,
as he named his program, eventually domi-
nate the backgammon scene, it would go on toing each game. This ranking is based on the
complexity of each game, the range of skills
required and the element of chance. Thus
checkers, the most straightforward game and
nominally the “easiest” (but deeper than it
gets credit for) comes first, whereas Scrabble,
which Roeder memorably describes as a sort
of “brainy heptathlon,” is sixth.
Rather surprisingly, the famously cerebral
game of chess is only second. Although
endlessly complicated for humans, chess is
not a terrible challenge for a computer
program with enough processing speed.
Armed only with the rules of the game and no
other human input, AlphaZero, the best chess
program in the world, played itself 44 million
times and discovered on its own the Queen’s
Gambit, the English Opening and the Sicilian
Defense.
The brilliance of the top-ranked human
chess player in the world, Magnus Carlsen,
pales beside computer-generated competi-
tors. More than 90 computer engines are
ranked higher than Carlsen. Check out Top
Chess Engine Championship to watch elite
computer programs play at a level that
humans have never matched.
Because they are completely governed by
rules, checkers, chess and Go can all be
mastered by computers. But that doesn’tloopholes used by the super-rich. The wealthy
also have an army of professional lobbyists,
lawyers and accountants looking for loopholes
in the tax code and shaping the rules where
they can.
This influence extends beyond the econo-
my: The children of the elite are dispropor-
tionately represented at America’s most selec-
tive colleges and universities, the top 1 percent
have access to teams of expensive lawyers in
the face of criminal charges, and they wield
outsize influence in elections through political
contributions and lobbying. The rules that are
meant to restrict the power of money in the
markets, the political system, the regulatory
system and education can all be gamed by the
wealthy.
Certainly, many of these billionaires are
innovators: It’s hard not to be impressed by the
business genius of a Jeff Bezos or an Elon
Musk. But after innovation mints new billion-
aires, what should happen next? There is
substantial agreement among economists and
social scientists that massively successful in-
novators need to be prevented from blocking
the next wave of innovation, which often
threatens their dominance.spondent, shows how they helped reshape an
economy that now works only for the wealthy.
(Bezos owns The Washington Post.) Over the
last several decades, the rich have clamped
down on wages, unions and taxes, building
enormous monopolies with expansive politi-
cal power. Their fortunes have grown while
the majority of the U.S. population has faced
stagnation or even a decline in living stan-
dards. Frustration over this state of affairs has
turned parts of the public in an anti-democrat-
ic and hyper-nationalist direction.
ProPublica, the nonprofit investigative
news organization, obtained IRS records
showing that Tesla founder Elon Musk, the
second-richest person in the world, paid no
federal income taxes in 2018. The very rich
often hold their stocks and shares in ways that
draw no tax: As Warren Buffet observed,
billionaires now pay lower tax rates than their
secretaries. And it is not as if they are paying
much in corporate taxes, either. By sending
profits abroad, companies like Facebook,
Amazon and Google have paid little or no U.S.
corporate tax. Recently, the leaked Pandora
Papers cast further light on the tax havens,
shell companies, complex trusts and other taxD
uring the last two years, millions of
Americans have seen their livelihoods
and lives upended as a global pandemic
has decreased life expectancy, shuttered busi-
nesses and schools, added to unemployment,
and devastated communities. But one group
has been doing quite well: billionaires. The
world’s 10 richest men doubled their fortunes
from $700 billion to $1.5 trillion, according to
a report by Oxfam International. Over the
same period, more than 160 million people
around the world have been pushed into
poverty.
It’s hard not to feel moral revulsion when
gigantic wealth is displayed as extreme pover-
ty and human suffering afflict the globe. But
why exactly does this inequality matter? Why
not simply focus on ending poverty and leave
the rich to their yachts and spaceships?
In “Davos Man: How the Billionaires De-
voured the World,” Peter S. Goodman delivers
a powerful and resounding answer: Outsize
wealth is an outsize threat to democracy.
Focusing on a handful of billionaire entrepre-
neurs — Jeff Bezos, Stephen Schwarzman,
Marc Benioff, Jamie Dimon and Larry Fink —
Goodman, a New York Times economics corre-Book World
DAVOS MAN
How the
Billionaires
Devoured the
World
By Peter S.
Goodman
Custom House.
472 pp. $29.99SEVEN GAMES
A Human
History
By Oliver Roeder
Norton.
306 pp. $26.95The richest of the
rich — including
Elon Musk, chief
executive of Tesla
and SpaceX — have
bent economies and
rules in their favor,
Peter S. Goodman
argues, noting that
Musk didn’t pay
federal income
taxes in 201 8.Goodman’s reporting is biting and bitterly
funny as he shows just how much the wealthy
wish to be admired. His five billionaires are
“Davos” men, showing up at the World Eco-
nomic Forum each year in the Swiss Alps,
determined to demonstrate their commit-
ment to the common good. As likely to refer-
ence Nelson Mandela as Milton Friedman, and
to begin their mornings with meditation ses-
sions, these Davos men tout their giving to
charity and their commitments to “stakehold-
er capitalism.” Unacknowledged, as Goodman
wryly notes, are their decades of tax avoidance
that weakens state capacity, their roles in the
gutting of antitrust laws, their lobbying for tax
cuts, their reckless financial gambling with
pension funds, their predatory privatization of
public services and their opposition to unions.
So, what is to be done? Goodman homes in
on one policy solution: taxes, and in particular,
a wealth tax. Economists Emmanuel Saez and
Gabriel Zucman estimate that a marginal tax
rate of 10 percent for wealth over $1 billion
would have raised $250 billion from the 400
richest Americans in 2018. Perhaps as impor-
tant, it would have deconcentrated wealth.
Given the analysis above, a wealth tax is
certainly a policy worth considering. So is
raising the income tax on high incomes. Even
if you don’t like paying taxes, you should want
the tax system to be fair. And we should not
forget that the unpaid taxes by the super-rich
mean more decaying roads, less money for
schools and more uncared-for children.
But would it solve all the problems that ail
our democracy? Goodman’s analysis would be
strengthened by looking at other factors that
contribute to the erosion of democracy: the
persistence of de facto segregation, unequal
opportunity and misinformation. While the
billionaires may have had a hand in this, it is
not they alone — and tax policy alone will not
fix it. We also need to consider policies to raise
voter turnout and increase the representation
of disadvantaged groups, policies that encour-
age unions and the use of wage boards to rein
in monopsony power, policies to end the
restrictive zoning that aims to keep poor
people out of wealthier communities. We need
to significantly boost investment in pre-K and
K-12 education, regulate the Internet, and
develop a national jobs policy aimed at reduc-
ing unemployment. Goodman keeps his focus
on billionaires and says little about alternative
explanations for inequality, such as the effects
of technology and globalization. Again, Davos
Man has certainly had an outsize influence on
these factors, but do we know how much
inequality would have happened without him?
Balzac reportedly said that behind every
great fortune is a great crime. That is, at best,
an exaggeration. But “Davos Man” shows us
that today’s extreme wealth is inextricably
linked to a great crime, perhaps the greatest
one of this century: the hijacking of our
democracy.ECONOMY REVIEW BY DEBRA SATZJONATHAN NEWTON/THE WASHINGTON POSTDemocracy
is under threat.
Are billionaires
to blame?
Debra Satz i s the Marta Sutton Weeks professor of
philosophy at Stanford University.yield real-world benefits in a variety of other
applications such as elevator traffic in tall
buildings and job scheduling for the space
shuttle.
As computers improved their play, so did
humans, who now study their games and
learn from commercial and free programs
such as eXtreme Gammon, PokerSnowie and
Quackle. This has helped to democratize the
games. You no longer have to live in certain
locations, or be able to afford to travel, to play
and study a game at the highest levels. You
can just go online or consult an app on your
phone. This is particularly true of poker,
where the wide availability of programs
known as solvers helps a new generation of
would-be pros pursue optimal betting strate-
gies.
But there may be downsides. The colorful,
larger-than life poker players with big hats
and jewelry are slowly being replaced by guys
in sunglasses and headphones who don’t
interact with anyone at the table. They may be
more successful, but they aren’t fun. Tradi-
tionalists fear that if the social aspect of the
game fades, so will the enthusiasm of the
casual gamblers who trust their luck and lose
reliably enough to bankroll the winners.
Bridge, the last game and the one Roeder
describes as “most ‘human,’” is perhaps the
most complex from a skill set perspective (it
even has its own special languages for bid-
ding). It is also the lone game of the seven
where artificial-intelligence programs still
trail human players. While its popularity has
fallen dramatically from its heyday in the
1930s and ’40s, being good at bridge is still
viewed by many on Wall Street as a predictor
of real-world success. Today, bridge tourna-
ments are subsidized by ultrarich patrons
who sponsor teams for bragging rights, the
same way other wealthy individuals might
sponsor a racehorse or racing sailboat.
Like the games it profiles, “Seven Games” is
accessible, enjoyable and ultimately quite
challenging. It raises provocative and some-
times unsettling questions about the nature
of intelligence and the unintended conse-
quences when machines play better than we
do. Roeder makes lots of sage observations
but doesn’t offer answers, just philosophical
paths to follow. If you are intrigued by this
rare opportunity to pull back the curtain on
how humans and computers learn, then you
will be richly rewarded. You might also
improve your game.T
hanks to the pandemic, Americans are
playing more games than ever — and
not just for entertainment. Something
else compels us to test our skills with games.
Or to put it another way, why can’t we stop
playing Wordle?
You might find some clues in Oliver Roed-
er’s illuminating new book, “Seven Games: A
Human History.” Roeder, a senior writer and
puzzle editor at FiveThirtyEight, has written a
fascinating group biography of some of the
most popular games of all time. In doing so,
he offers powerful insights into why we play
games and what we can learn from them.
You’ve probably played at least one of the
seven games profiled: checkers, chess, Go,
backgammon, poker, Scrabble and bridge.
Roeder chose them in part because of their
longevity. An early version of checkers is
mentioned in Plato’s “Republic,” and a proto-
type of backgammon was found in a 3rd-cen-
tury Nubian tomb (by comparison, Scrabble,
invented during the Great Depression, is the
new kid on the block).
Each game gets its own biographical chap-
ter that digs into what makes it unique. Also
included is a rough sketch of the rules of play
and the skill sets needed to win. We’re
introduced to legends of the games like the
humble and devout Marion Tinsley, who lost
only three times in a 40-year period of playing
competitive checkers. Roeder himself com-
petes in the World Series of Poker and the
Scrabble Players Championship, for which he
memorizes nearly 35,000 words.
The real payoff from the group biography
concept — the connective tissue that ties the
book together — is the way Roeder illustrates
the impact these games have had on artificial
intelligence. This gets to the heart of what
makes games so valuable, both for humans
and for computers.
Games allow humans to make decisions
and experience agency in a limited context. As
Rice University philosopher Gwen Bradford
observes, “Every time you play a game you are
choosing to do something that is more
difficult than it has to be.” When we strive and
come up with solutions, it gives us an
important sense of achievement (hence, the
appeal of Wordle).
More specifically, games are made up of
arbitrarily imposed rules. Following those
rules allows us to practice making choices
and solving problems in a controlled environ-
ment. Which also makes them a perfect tool
for teaching computers how to think.
Roeder has arranged the chapters in his
book according to “a rough menu of intelli-
gence” that correlates — broadly — to the
difficulty computer programs have in master-Seven games that challenge the human brain — and teach computers to think
HISTORY REVIEW BY LUCINDA ROBBRICKY CARIOTI/THE WASHINGTON POSTChess is a
complicated puzzle
for humans, but it’s
not so difficult for
computers to
master, says Oliver
Roeder, who writes
about that game
and six others:
checkers,
backgammon,
bridge, poker, Go
and Scrabble.Lucinda Robb w orked for 15 years for the Teaching
Company and is a co-author with Rebecca Boggs
Roberts of the young-adult book “The Suffragist
Playbook: Your Guide to Changing the World.”