they live like miserable gods preoccupied with escaping from reality
It's because they realize something as they age: For all their wealth, they are still mortal, their physical bodies will decline, and their egotistical, narcissistic lifetime will ultimately amount to absolutely nothing as they rot in the ground and cease existing like everyone else.
Mortality puts things into perspective for those people because they're driven by a philosophical imperative that's borderline pathological in nature:
Donald Trump watched the video of himself almost getting headshot on repeat, 9 times a day. Some said it was PTSD, but that's assuming a lot.
There was a quote from one of them the other day talking about being unable to sleep well because he's constantly afraid of people coming after him for what he's got. If only there were a way to remove that target from your back...
Apparently as long as you have someone else do the immoral things on your behalf, its all gravy. Free will and all right? They could have just not done the evil things that I paid them to do.