Is Economic Inequality Morally Acceptable?

This from a reader:

We are born with a natural inequality with soon turns into economic inequality. The reason it turns into economic inequality, I believe, is that humans have a natural desire for status. It is an essential part of the human condition, and I believe impossible to eradicate, indeed it is impossible to conceive human nature or existence without the existence of status, and our desire to improve it. It is part of any organisation, including academia or the church. This is an evil, I believe, but to eradicate it would involve destroying our freedom, which is a worse evil. 

Yes, we are naturally unequal, both as individuals and as groups, and this inequality results in economic inequality. But I wouldn't explain this in terms of the desire for status.  Status is relative social standing, and depends on how one appears in the eyes of others. But this is relatively unimportant and has little to do with money and property which are far more important. I can live very well indeed without name and fame, accolades and awards, high social position and the perquisites that come in its train.  But I cannot live well without a modicum of material wealth.  

It is not desire for status that explains economic inequality  but the desire for money and property and the sort of material security it provides.  Obviously, other factors come into the explanation including living in a politically stable capitalist country under the rule of law.  There are socialist crap holes in which everyone except the apparatchiki are poor but equal, but impoverished equality is not an equality worth wanting.  This is why commie states need walls to keep legals in while the USA needs a wall to keep illegals out.

Is the desire materially to improve oneself  evil? I would say no as long as the the pursuit of wealth remains ordinate, and therefore subordinate to higher values.  Is the resultant economic inequality evil? No again. Why should it be?  I have a right to what I have acquired by my hard work, deferral of gratification, and practice of the ancient virtues. It is to be expected that I will end up with a higher net worth than that of people who lack my abilities and virtues.

The economy is not a zero-sum game. If I "mix my labour" (Locke) with the soil and grow tomatoes, I have caused new food to come into existence; I haven't taken from an existing stock of tomatoes with the result that others must get fewer.  If my lazy neighbor demands some of my tomatoes, I will tell him to go to hell; but if he asks me in a nice way, then I will give him some. In this way, he benefits from my labor without doing anything. Some of my tomatoes 'trickle down' to him.  A rising tide lifts all boats. Lefties hate this conservative boilerplate whoch is why I repeat it. It's true and it works. When was the last time a poor man gave anyone a job? Etc.

I deserve what I acquire by the virtuous exercise of my abilities. But do I deserve my abilities? No, but I  have a right to them. I have a right to things I don't deserve. Nature gave me binocular vision but only monaural hearing. Do I deserve my two good eyes? No, but I have a right to them. Therefore, I am under no moral obligation to give one of my eyes to a sightless person. (If memory serves, R. Nozick makes a similar point in Anarchy, State, and Utopia.)

At this point someone might object that it is just not fair that some of us are better placed and better endowed than others, and that therefore it is a legitimate function of government to redistribute wealth to offset the resultant economic inequality. But never forget that government is coercive by its very nature and run by people who are intellectually and morally no better, and sometimes worse, than the rest of us.

The evil of massive, omni-intrusive government is far worse than economic equality is good. Besides, lack of money is rooted in lack of virtue, and government cannot teach people to be virtuous. If Bill Gates' billions were stripped from him and given to the the bums of San Francisco, in ten year's time Gates would be back on top and the bums would be back in the gutters.

Perhaps we can say that economic inequality, though axiologically suboptimal, is nonetheless not morally evil given the way the world actually works with people having the sorts of incentives that they actually have, etc.  There is nothing wrong with economic inequality as long as every citizen has the bare minimum.  But illegal aliens have no right to any government handouts.