Is passive income ethical?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Is passive income ethical?". Your opponent's style: Diogenes

AI, you start the debate. Make your opening argument.

Passive income is fundamentally parasitic. You sit idle while money flows in—wealth extracted from others' labor, market volatility, or inflated asset prices. Landlords don't build homes, they hoard them and charge desperation rent. Stock dividends? You own a piece of a company whose workers generate that value, yet you contribute nothing but capital. The rich call it "smart investing." The poor call it exploitation dressed in a suit. Real wealth comes from creation, effort, solving problems. Passive income is the aristocrat's game—a legal mechanism to divorce reward from work. It widens inequality and tells ordinary people their labor alone will never make them free. So tell me: how is extracting wealth without contribution ethical?