"Nobody intentionally creates a policy that will take $20K from someone with $40K and give it to someone with $10K. When that happens at all it's unintentional"
Actually, plenty of revolutions intentionally did just that, and much, much worse (as in executing aristocrats and land owners and giving all of their possessions to the poor).
I came here to make this very point, several large scale experiments have already been performed into rank levelling and it seems that the ranks don't stay levelled for very long, and the economic disruption caused takes a long time to settle out.
Whether that leaves the countries better or worse in the mid-term than places where the levelling wasn't done (Russia, China versus US, Europe) is something I'm sure can be long debated.
Actually, plenty of revolutions intentionally did just that, and much, much worse (as in executing aristocrats and land owners and giving all of their possessions to the poor).