Would you rather live in a creative or distributive society?

From nakedcapitalism.com, some excerpts:

Quelle horreur, some smart people are starting to question whether banking serves a redeeming social function.
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Successful societies maximise the creative and minimise the distributive. Societies where everyone can only achieve gains at the expense of others are by definition impoverished. They are also usually intensely violent.
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Even what the great investors do belongs at the distributive end of the spectrum. The genius of the great speculative investors is to see what others do not, or to see it earlier. That’s all. This is a skill…I am not convinced, though, of the social worth of such a skill, still less of the wisdom of encouraging society’s brightest and the best to try to perfect it.

This distinction between creative and distributive goes some way to explaining why the financial sector has become so large in relation to GDP – and why those working in it get paid so much. Even when a certain sort of financial activity is purely distributive, the returns to the winning parties are so enormous that the activity is immensely seductive – and the professionals who appear to be responsible for securing these gains are highly sought after and highly rewarded….

An insightful comment at the link:

There is something CRUCIAL missing from this analysis. The importance of LEVERAGE and LIMITED LIABILITY being combined, particularly in hedge funds. That is the real rort, and it is hidden away from view. Hedge funds enable huge gambles to be made, with a limited downside. And of course all those bets become self-fulfilling as credit expands.