Gotcha. Yeah I thought your point was that the current wealth inequality is OK because here's an example of a society with large wealth inequality that we would all agree is also OK.
I think when people mention wealth inequality they're understanding it in their minds as income inequality; I generally do.
I expect they do and I expect that the people in the survey who were asked what they thought the distribution of wealth in the US was gave something that approximated what they thought the distribution of income was. The fact that the two are easy to confuse is what made the article actively bad, rather than merely pointless.
I think when people mention wealth inequality they're understanding it in their minds as income inequality; I generally do.