The SEC and equality

My friend is relatively new to crypto and he wanted to put some money into an ICO he found because it was a market he was very familiar with and sort of grasped the concept quickly and thought it was a good idea. He then went to look into how to purchase it and found out it cannot be purchased in the US unless you registered as an "accredited investor".

Here is what the SEC says about being an accredited investor.

"An accredited investor, in the context of a natural person, includes anyone who:

earned income that exceeded $200,000 (or $300,000 together with a spouse) in each of the prior two years, and reasonably expects the same for the current year, OR
has a net worth over $1 million, either alone or together with a spouse (excluding the value of the person’s primary residence).
On the income test, the person must satisfy the thresholds for the three years consistently either alone or with a spouse, and cannot, for example, satisfy one year based on individual income and the next two years based on joint income with a spouse. The only exception is if a person is married within this period, in which case the person may satisfy the threshold on the basis of joint income for the years during which the person was married and on the basis of individual income for the other years.

In addition, entities such as banks, partnerships, corporations, nonprofits and trusts may be accredited investors. Of the entities that would be considered accredited investors and depending on your circumstances, the following may be relevant to you:

any trust, with total assets in excess of $5 million, not formed to specifically purchase the subject securities, whose purchase is directed by a sophisticated person, or
any entity in which all of the equity owners are accredited investors.
In this context, a sophisticated person means the person must have, or the company or private fund offering the securities reasonably believes that this person has, sufficient knowledge and experience in financial and business matters to evaluate the merits and risks of the prospective investment."

So basically you have to be what would be considered wealthy to buy it. The average joe just cant pick up some of this ICO without becoming an accredited investor. This part sort of makes me chuckle because you hear all about income inequality etc these days but the SEC wants to prevent you from being able to buy something simply because you arent rich. They give the rich special opportunities that the average person cant have. Way to really care about income inequality! lol

I always find it odd that some are in favor of this type of ruling but then in the same breath complain about income inequality and the rich getting richer. Good work screwing over the little guy under the guise of protecting them! doesnt matter how smart you are or how wise you are at investing or the fact that you may have made a bunch of profit off of crypto and have nothing to lose by investing. You will be discriminated against and have opportunities taken away simply because you aren't rich. Nice work!