[Atyreus]

But most people, if they have access to a computer and time to spend online, either will have the money to finance online game play or have the time and ability to work at McDonald's to earn the money to do so. In this sense, everyone who is even in a position to consider spending/wasting time playing games potentially has both the time and money to do so. Both time and money are limited assets which someone may be unwilling to invest in a game. For high school and college students it's more likely to be the former. For working folks with families, it's much more likely to be the latter (this is, after all, the gamer's curse - when we have plenty of time to spend on games, we often don't have huge sums of money to invest in gaming, when we finally have the money, we often no longer have the time).

As for "fair," the only meaningful criteria really is transparency. If the players know how the cards are stacked they can decide for themselves whether or not a particular game will present them with a worthwhile experience that is worth spending time and/or money on.

An unfair situation would be more along the lines of an admin who is secretly receiving payments from players in exchange for in-game perks. In a situation such as this, there is a lack of transparency - most players involved in the game will not be aware that they are playing by a set of rules that are other than those which they have been led to believe they are playing by.

You (the indefinite "you") might not want to compete with people who can pay to power themselves up, but this doesn't make that system unfair. It just makes it a system which isn't amenable to your style of play or your willingness to invest in the game financially or your personal feelings about whether or not games should seek financial compensation from players. Some other players might find a game which (like many games) hugely benefits people who don't work eight hour a day disagreeable. Again, such a game wouldn't be unfair on this basis alone. It just might not provide the most enjoyable experience for certain classes of players.

Everyone who chooses to play such games will understand the rules and, by playing them, have tacitly accepted these rules as fair even though they may advantage some players over others. This is no different from me choosing to play chess against someone I know is much better than me. I may have no chance of winning, but no one would really consider such a match to be unfair. If he keeps really whupping my ass, I might decide that playing him is no longer fun. But this decision has nothing to do with fairness.