Reply #4: We need to drive a stake into the heart of the Horatio Alger myth [View All]

[Warpy]

once and for all. These guys who went from rags to riches always seem to have started off with some pretty classy damned rags, along with a huge selection of family and family friends to tap for seed money and employment favors when it was time for them to make their own way in the world.

Gates came from a family that was wealthy enough to send him to Harvard, ferkrissakes.

Lamebawl's people were wealthy corporate lawyers with clients he could tap for all sorts of favors.

Even if the scions of the rich don't inherit a fortune when they turn 21, what they do inherit is family and family connections that no amount of lottery money can buy.

This is one reason the Horatio Alger myth is so destructive. It fails to take all this into account, and those of us who were born without money or family connections are left to blame ourselves for not getting rich.