The confusion is, in part, because one of the functional underpinnings of capitalism is “make a bet” as a method of allocating resources.

Those whose bets paid off didn’t “earn” the money, they “won” it. Calling it “earned” confuses “being morally deserving” with “receiving”.

The positive functional effect of “take a risk and get more money if it pays off” is that folks who allocate capital well end up with more capital to allocate.

Of course, this is imperfect ; there are those who allocate capital poorly (by some definition) yet win returns anyways, and some who allocate it well while being unable to capture the value they create.