This has hardly been an aristocratic or noble or elite eternal ideal, but rather one which grew up only gradually.
It became pronounced with the gradual march of capitalism through the Modern period, and has become overwhelming only in the Age of the Democratic Revolution, which coincided with the Industrial Revolution, and the collapse of the Old European Order.
Wealth of course was always part of what made it possible for nobilities and aristocracies to endure in power over time.
But wealth is hardly the same as greed.
Being wealthy was not what being a member of an elite even meant, until a little over a century ago or so.
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