holy fuck is this wrong. the government built the railroads, period, and paid private individuals handsomely to do so. it was fully fucking intentional. the robber barons didn't get out front of it, they hitched their wagons to government and then warped government further in their interest.
the policy of the united states is to make a few individuals ridiculously, mind bendingly wealthy. and there's a bunch of petit-rich and outright poors who think that's all just happenstance and the government not only doesn't have anything to do with it, but the government is actually standing in the way of it. it's a complete lie pushed by billionaires through a web of bullshit think tanks peddling narratives to poors. and every once in a while when the citizens through their government decide that maybe billionaires shouldn't be killing quite so many of the rest us we get focused, polity-bending action funneled through the web created by those same think tanks. the powell memorandum may have taken decades to come to its full fruition but if there's one thing generational wealth is good at, it's long term thinking.