This quote is partially apt to your idea:

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." -GB Shaw

I don't fully agree with the quotation from Shaw, but there's some truth to it. And I suspect a common quality of the billionaire class is ruthless unreasonableness -- and considerable luck.

Progress isn't always a goal.

In fact, I could speculate that humanity might benefit from slowing down progress on most non-medical industries right now.