[quote=@Blue Demon]Most Billionaires are old money. their parents were rich and now they're rich. Only very, very few people make it without already having connections.
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Nope. There are as many bootstrappers (the proverbial 'rags to riches') in the Forbes 400 as there are folks who inherited their billions and sat on them. A little under 10% each. The majority of the ultra-rich came from the upper middle class and started successful business enterprises; Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are two notable examples. While they were by no means ever living in poverty, they nonetheless very much qualify as self-made, being two of the richest men on planet Earth and having started in suburbia. The oft-told story of ancient WASP families holding all of the world's wealth hundreds of years running is patently untrue.