How fifth-graders 50 years ago had more common sense than billionaires

Billionaires: They're just like us!

In this case, they're just like I was in fifth grade.

Consider this: Billionaires are increasingly planning new, utopian cities. About 50 years ago, I worked with classmates to create a new, utopian island. We were 10 and we knew it was a silly exercise, but they're serious.

Proposed utopian cites are a real thing. An article on Axios shares the details of a city called Telosa that will be built in Utah, Nevada or Arizona (who can tell the difference, right?) by billionaire Marc Lore. Lore is a guy who apparently builds and sells companies. He sold Jet.com to Walmart and Diapers.com to Amazon. I'd never heard of him before this, either.

Lore plans for 5 million people to ultimately live in Telosa, with 50,000 folks moving there by 2030 (less than eight years from now!). According to the report, Lore is currently looking for 150,000 acres on which to build the city, which will have autonomous electric vehicles, no on-street parking and 36 districts that have everything you need within a short walk. There will be vast amounts of renewable energy and some sort of "drought-proof" water system.

Lore isn't the only billionaire with such plans. According to Axios, Bill Gates wants to build a "smart city" called Belmont in the Arizona desert (if it's so smart, why is it in the Arizona desert?). Elon Musk wants to build a city called Starbase in southern Texas. I presume if Warren Buffet considered doing something similar, he would simply look around Omaha, Nebraska, and figure it was already utopian.

American billionaires aren't alone in this dream. Toyota is building a model city in Japan, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is building a city in Saudi Arabia and Tech company Tencent  is building a city in China. They all have the same thing in common. Each of these billionaires or companies thinks they can use smart technology to make a utopian world, where everything runs well and everyone gets along. Most of the cities have some plan for the perfect government, too.

Of course, they forget that every such attempt in history has failed. Movies show us how it ends up: With some powerful group in charge, exploiting people while everyone wears monochromatic jumpsuits until a traveler from the past or future finally rallies the people to rebel.

It's equally inspiring and terrifying that people who are good at business think they can build a utopian society.

My classmates and I had the same view, but it was more practical from a 10-year-old's perspective. The island we imagined had volcanoes that erupted with edible chocolate, trees that grew candy and wells full of soda. Kids were in charge of everything. Everyone played and ate sweets every day. It was an island, so it was protected from the adults who presumably ran the rest of the world.

Of course, that wouldn't work. There would be problems that would have to be solved. We knew that our invented island wasn't practical, it was just an assignment from a creative teacher.

Who knew that 50 years later, billionaires would have similar plans, but would lack the common sense of a 10-year-old?

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@outlook.com.