If they’re not in it for the money, they’ll be happy to pay more tax

Taxes are money that they lose control of.

There is a reason Bill Gates didn't just write the IRS a check for $175B and created the Gates foundation instead.

That's kind of the opposite of your original claim then.

They're in it for the money as it allows them to exert control. That's still being in it for the money.

They are in it for manually appreciating their own assets, which has the intrinsic effect of generating wealth.

A better way to frame it that doesn't hinge on the colloquial vs literal meaning of "in it for the money".

Okay, so they are in it to grow their assets, so they can leverage them in their life in this world. And those assets probably get evaluated or assessed at some point, and get assigned some numerical value. And the unit of measurement used for that evaluation may be referencing something like a currency, that other people can understand for its use as a medium of exchange. I see that is very different than money.