It's not insurmountable. Do you need to be mindful of self-dealing regulations? Of course. However, there are many investment opportunities available to non-wealthy people which can be pursued via self-directed ROTHs and LLCs owned by them. Real estate (financing, bridge financing, rental ownership, distressed property flipping, etc...) is probably the most commonly used one I've seen IRL but I've still seen it used for investing in friends and family rounds of startups, etc...
It's certainly not a "yolo do whatever you want, the IRS won't care" fund but it is still available to the non-wealthy. I know many people who have been making use of it for years without any unfair government characterization or attention. The best I've personally seen is a couple in their early 30s with ~$7 million (real estate related dealings) in their self-directed roth which is a far cry from $5 billion, obviously, but pretty amazing nonetheless.
It's certainly not a "yolo do whatever you want, the IRS won't care" fund but it is still available to the non-wealthy. I know many people who have been making use of it for years without any unfair government characterization or attention. The best I've personally seen is a couple in their early 30s with ~$7 million (real estate related dealings) in their self-directed roth which is a far cry from $5 billion, obviously, but pretty amazing nonetheless.