Yes. Obviously.
I too most often point to late 18th century France - the final days of the Ancien Régime - as the best comparison of which we have extensive knowledge. They were in essentially the exact same position that we’re in right now - with an entrenched and wholly self-absorbed ruling class manipulating absolutely everything for their immediate gain entirely regardless of the harm done to others or to society as a whole.
And apparently the lesson the ruling class in the US has taken from their history is to try to arrange things so that the peasantry won’t or can’t rise up against their egregious abuses.
Which of course just means that they’ll be able to, and will, keep on undermining everything for their own short-term gain that much longer, until the whole rotten structure inevitably collapses under its own weight.
Either way, they lose in the long run, but they’re so profoundly mentally ill that that won’t stop them.
I don’t believe they’re unaware of this, at least not the ones who aren’t deluding themselves that they’re actually doing something positive or constructive. I think most of them believe - and justifiably so - that they’ll be able to enjoy their (ill-gotten) gains and die before the collapse. It’s a massive game of hot-potato.
The ones with grandchildren they care about probably just work hard to delude themselves that they are a constructive force in society, and that there will be no collapse.
“While some members of society might raise the alarm that the system is moving towards an impending collapse and therefore advocate structural changes to society in order to avoid it, Elites and their supporters, who opposed making these changes, could point to the long sustainable trajectory “so far” in support of doing nothing.” Sounds familiar…