What if the person is rich and can afford polygamy


I think it would be ok, but the man would still be taking a very high risk in displeasing GOD Almighty for anything that goes wrong in the marriages and the damages that it would cost the wives and the kids. If his kids will not be a burden on the society, and he makes sure that his wives are all treated well and equally as much as he can, even though he will never be perfectly just, then he might be ok.
Brining well educated kids into a Muslim society definitely helps. But if a rich guy practices polygamy the way some of the oil rich Gulf-Arab multi billionaires practice it; by marrying and divorcing on Thursdays which ensures that he never exceeds four women, and at the same time he always experiences new sexual pleasure with a new woman every week, then believe me Allah Almighty will damn him really bad in the Day of Judgment, because this is not the spiritual point from allowing polygamy in the Noble Quran!
I think practicing polygamy among those who can afford it really depends on the individual case. If the man's wife strongly opposes to polygamy to a point that she would seek a divorce, then obviously he can never satisfy her, and most probably can never be fair enough with her because he would be always fighting and arguing with her, where it may not be the case with the other wife. So destroying a marital life and damaging the kids for a personal reason is really not fair by itself, unless of course the wife is unbearable and the man and wife don't want the divorce, which in this case it would be a great idea for the man to have another wife.
Also, some Muslim women don't mind polygamy. And yes, some of them even seek wives for their husbands. If this is the case, then polygamy in this case would not be a problem, provide that the man can financially afford it and can provide a good quality life for all of his wives, and most importantly, can provide a good quality of education to his children.
As I said above, Allah Almighty clearly revealed Noble Verse 4:3 for the protection of the Orphans and to solve a major social imbalance between men and women. The Noble Verse never really came for man's pleasure, nor did it come for general purposes like in the Bible where men can practice polygamy for just about any reason.
So men in Islam are really taking risks when they practice polygamy for personal reasons only, because they will be held accountable for everything that goes wrong in the multiple marriages, and for any martial dissolutions that will ultimately hurt the kids the most.

An email I received from a Christian

God (YHWH - the Eternal One) portrays Himself, through the words of His prophet, as the Husband of two "wives," Aholah and Aholibah, representing Samaria (Kingdom of Israel) and Jerusalem (Kingdom of Judah). Now this is a spritual figure, not a literal physical one, for God is not a man, with literal wives. Yet, the physical, temporal example used to illustrate a spiritual lesson or point must be valid. Nathan, God's prophet, chastised King David for raping Bathsheba and having her husband, Uriah the Hittite (probably a proselyte to the faith of God), murdered. He said to David that God had given much to David, including his 'master's' (Saul, David's predecessor on the throne) WIVES. These in addition to the number of wives David already had, plus a number of concubines. And, Nathan said, if those had not been enough God would have given him more!! It is not certain that the father of the man who took his father's wife was a polygamist. He well could have been a widower who had remarried whose son, the fornicator, had lain with his second wife, not the son's mother but his stepmother. The son's own mother may have been dead. At any rate, the son did not respect the status of his stepmother and her relationship with his father but treated her as an harlot. It is also possible that the father was also dead and the son in his lust pretended that he could take his (in his opinion) former stepmoter to bed, or wherever he took her.
Polygamy is a concession to the imperfections and imbalances in humanity. There have never been provided one woman for every man and one man for every woman. In all cases of civilized society (ignoring a few frontier, unsettled regions and war-torn areas) there are always more women of marriageable age than men of marriageable age. For one thing, women attain marriageable age several years earlier than men. Mary, mother of Jesus, is believed to have been 13 or 14 when she bore Him. Was God, the Holy Spirit, a statutory rapist by our standards? Hardly. God is not ruled by man's laws and customs or opinions. English common law set the minimum age for marriage at 12 for females. Jewish tradition set it at 10. Many American states set the minimum age at 12, 14, 15 and 16. Canada allows females members of native American tribes to marry at 7 according to their tribal laws, though when they reach 14 they can repudiate such marriages as lacking their understanding consent (after being married for 7 years and even bearing several children?).
Unlike the Mormon teachings the Bible does not encourage polygamy; it simply permits it. This is similar to Mohammed's permission of up to 4 wives but then only if the man is certain he can treat them all equitably and love them without favoritism other than due respect to his first wife.