But people don't only care about rank in wealth. I think you're focusing too much on that one aspect. A rising tide lifting all boats has a lot more impact to how nice it is to live in the world than a short-term shuffling of social status.
I think relative to the kinds of wealth increases the bottom 50% of the world is permitted to realize (e.g. access to ad-drenched web services and internet devices, entertainment consumables, heavily processed food, clearly-second-class medical care), the loss in status matters more.
People might be willing to accept a lessened station in life if the offsetting overall increases in wealth that they get to see are significant in their lives. The fact that at least 50% of the population is more concerned with rank than with overall well-being is, for me, a shameful indictment of how little we actually use societal wealth to improve impoverished lives to any degree, let alone a degree that would justify setting aside primal Last Place Aversion.
