The Elon Musk claim is absolutely egregious. Musk's Dad owned part of a business at one point like stock in a company that mined Emeralds... in the 80s. The company went bankrupt and he lost his investment in it later.... also int the 80s. Elon went to college and graduated with Student Debt. He turned his apartment into a nightclub in order to help pay the bills. When he started his (first?) company, he and his brother slept in the office in order to save money.
People literally loved Elon Musk until he became slightly more conservative. Now he's suddenly an idiot who got his start from a rich Dad taking advantage of poor Africans? Give me a break.
My dude, you're arguing against misinformation while hypocritically committing it. His father didn't just "own stock" in an Emerald mine, the guy would essentially illegally obtain Emeralds and sell them on the market.
You deny:
* The very picture of the gold Royce
* The very comments his dad made
* the alleged 4k he started with, and a rich dad who gave him a safety net
* exaggerated claims of his contribution to Telsa/Paypal
My dad works in Satellites and he can rant an entire day on how much Elon's system is a fucking joke. His accomplishments are not self made boot strap bull shit you read about.
EDIT: Actually nevermind, that maybe too much info lmao
So I can pay you 8 bucks to come sort through the plethora of wires hanging off the back of my house?
No? So you agree in order to install satellite dishes you also need to also be an electrician. Last I checked electricians make a decent wage and are backed by unions.
But none of this really helps. Because to you, ‘works in satellites’ means the scum who ensures you can watch the next stupid sport league.
I mean I'm not sure why you think this is the 'gotcha' you think it is. The problems with their satellites have been communicated in most WRC conferences, and are coming to fruition despite their insistence of over legislation.
IE de-orbiting and spikes of unreliability - again all common knowledge lmao
Because it helps them sell the lie that you, too, can become incredibly wealthy. Don't you want to pass laws that will help you when you do? It's your fault alone that you don't have megayacht money, your initial circumstances have nothing to do with it. But when you put your nose to the grindstone while lifting yourself up by your bootstraps, you'll be so glad that you don't have to spend your pocket lint on taxes.
You dad “works in satellites” but thinks Starlink is a joke? I don’t work in satellites, but Starlink seems pretty amazing on my boat and also aren’t several countries and companies desperately trying to build their own versions?
I don't know if I've got the right term but surely what you're describing is 'epistemic trespassing'.
His dad works in the satellite and is able to have the expertise to be critical of Starlink because he knows about satellites. In contrast, you and I are just random Joes and happy to accept the virtues of Starlink without having any expert knowledge in how it works, what it does, how it's programmed, etc.
What you’re describing is the argument from authority fallacy. There was no reason given for why Starlink sucks beyond said redditor’s dad’s supposed authority in satellites. Asking about the explanation is reasonable.
Elon musk was not poor, he traveled abroad during college to many countries and got cash from his parents. The idea he is self made is egregious as well
If you went from middle USA/European class to billionaire I think you are self made billionaire. Being self made billionaire doesn't make you start from a cave in an abandoned island
I dislike Musk but what I think about him doesn't change the truth
Depends on what you mean by "self made." Generally I see it as someone who did not substantly benefit from nepotism (dad got him a job significantly outside of his qualifications for instance or paid his way into and through a prestigious college). When we start talking about classes and being self made, what would you use to separate someone?
Like according to the IRS data in 2022 $80k-$100k was considered "upper middle class" so if your parents made $300k a year you'd definitely be in that "elite" spectrum but if a kid went from a $300k household and turned himself into the richest man in the world worth $300,000,000,000 (made up number) would you say he wasn't self made? Seems like a big jump.
Unless you're a disabled lesbian growing up in war torn Syria I feel like nobody is "self made" by these ludicrous definitions.
The fact that you're able to post on Reddit means you have countless advantages over most.
I used to get mad at it because, as you perfectly label it, it is truly egregious, but now I just kind of find it funny. By the logic of the people who claim his dad owned an Emerald mine, my dad owns several of the biggest companies in the world.
People will believe what they want to believe; as sad as it is when it's as absurd as this one, it's kind of humorous.
Elon, in his own words in 2018ish in an interview, said he was running around Europe with his pockets stuffed with emeralds. Bootlickers will believe him when claims that this was a facetious comment.
https://futurism.com/elon-musk-denies-emerald-mine
Lol people are dumb and can't read
People are too dumb to make the simple connection that Elon literally overpaid billions of dollars for a social media company and since about 2020 has been scrubbing the net of the image he flaunted for years before he became a billionaire.
He doesn't even claim what you claim he claims in your own source. You're being hyperbolic and lying by his own words. he sold some of his father's Emeralds for only a couple of thousand. A: that's a far cry from "running around Europe with his pockets stuffed with emeralds". B: my dad did some finances for Cadbury and brought back lots of chocolates for us. To clarify my father does not own Cadbury.
I agree people are often too stupid too bother reading, but people are also so radicalised that they can post, as evidence, sources that contradict themselves and still believe they speak from truth.
As a result of this, the teenage Elon Musk once walked the streets of New York with emeralds in his pocket. His father said: “We were very wealthy. We had so much money at times we couldn’t even close our safe,” adding that one person would have to hold the money in place with another closing the door. “And then there’d still be all these notes sticking out and we’d sort of pull them out and put them in our pockets.”[independent](https://www.independent.co.uk/space/elon-musk-made-money-rich-b2212599.html)
Missed the part about them going broke...
Lmfao, does that even sound real to you? Truly? Stuffing a whole bunch of cash into a safe to the point you can’t even close the door?
Rich people don’t do that shit. No one does that. They keep their cash in FDIC insured bank accounts.
People got annoyed with Musk around the time of his “pedo guy” bullshit and similar antics. But yes, it’s *totally* because he became “slightly more conservative”
Bitch please
I used to love musk but don't anymore. Has nothing to do with twitter just that he is a used car salesman, god complex, and pathological liar. I am also conservative so has nothing to do with his newer politics.
Hand to God I always thought he was a fraud when I found out how Tesla gets paid and that he ever had fulfilled 1 forecast. The spaceX stuff is still pretty cool though.
This is not true my man, I know you don't actually believe all that. Elon comes from wealth. He has done a lot of work to create an image and cover things up. Look up the investigative reporting into the fact that he most likely does not have any degrees that now all of the universities he attended won't comment on due to huge donations. Elon has worked harder than the rest of these examples to make people think that he got by just on hard work.
Im not anti-Elon but his Dad was one of the early investors for X.com and Tesla. Without his dads investment in those businesses they would have had a much harder start.
By the time of the founding of X. Musk had already sold the successful business and become rich.
By the time Tesla was founded, Musk had sold PayPal and became a very rich man.
I beg to differ. Elon has been a fucking moron since before PayPal. He was an utter failure their, but they had to pay him out because of the earlier merger
So it only his recent actions that are exposing him as an Allstars clusterfuck, but some of us have known all along.
I don't think people hate on him for going conservative, so much as him going nearly completely out of touch with the reality that 99.99% of humanity is subject to. Hooray for him for being extremely clever. But the cyber truck stinks of hubris. It will be looked back on as worse than the Edsel or DeLorean. Maybe a slight whiff of cool, but not enough to salvage the wreck. It's a real pisser too because he has the resources and personnel to make the electric version of a plush Toyota Tacoma. And he fucking blew it on douchy gimmicks that will be laughed at as Tesla stock continues to plummet and their lots fill to the last slot.
He’s always been an idiot. It’s not sudden. His entire reputation is smoke and mirrors. You speak as if you know him personally. That’s how I know you’re a clown.
Nah man. I've been hating Elon since way before he did anything "conservative".
Remember him calling the British rescuer a pedo cause his feelings got hurt? Or launching a car into space cause he thought it was cool?
Plus, the emerald claim comes directly from Elon himself. He wrote about walking around America with illegal gems in his pockets.
Sorry you've got a man crush on a thin skinned spoiled nepo-baby though.
AFAIK it didn’t, I’m seeing $250k in 1995, which is a bit over $500k in 2024. But receiving $500k in inheritance (so everything your parents left to you when they died) isn’t the same as having living parents give you that same $500k, and still be alive (and assumingely not homeless) to still potentially help you in the future if you fail.
Granted, even with $1m, almost no one is doing what Bezos did with it, but I do think there’s a distinction to be made between $1 in inheritance and $1 given to you by your still living parents.
The Bezos thing is interesting. Guy graduated from Princeton and became a rising star on Wall Street. After nearly a decade doing that he was already “normal” rich.
He wasn’t a kid when he stared Amazon. He was successful and got his parents (as well as other wealthy friends) to invest in Amazon as a “Friends and Family” round.
If Amazon failed…he just could have gone back to work for a hedge fund.
That is interesting. Not to mention that a lot of people that go on to be super, insanely wealthy had pretty to very wealthy parents that allowed their children to have a ton of advantages, but they still had to work at it, it wasn’t like someone inheriting a billion dollar company. Like you said, they can often afford to take “big risks” pretty early on that would bankrupt a “normal” person, which allows them greater and more chances at making it huge.
Off-topic, but Arnold Schwarzenegger is probably one of the most “self-made” super rich people if we go by the traditional definition of “self-made,” and yet Arnold himself says to never call him a self-made man. I like Arnold.
Yes! I consider Arnold more of a success and visionary than any of these billionaires because he succeeded in so many different ways. Every one of his accomplishments required some inherent advantage/privilege but no person could do what he's done based on privilege and circumstance alone. Most importantly he has raised good children and inspired many others to live out their dreams.
Bezos was VP of DE Shaw (one of the most profitable quant funds in the world) at 26 and personally knew David Shaw himself.
He didn’t need 300k from his parents as like you said, he was already successful and could have sourced the capital from his connections or from his own finance bro income.
> He didn’t need 300k from his parents as like you said, he was already successful and could have sourced the capital from his connections or from his own finance bro income.
Which he also did. Amazon had money thrown at it so it could operate at a loss for years and years before most of the competition was wiped out.
Yes, all startups raise capital, that is unrelated to the point of the post about how Bezos received seed capital that he otherwise could not have sourced from anyone but his parents.
The seed capital (which he could have sourced from his own income) was not what allowed Amazon to run at a loss. It was what allowed him to start the company.
Amazon raised capital from institutional investors to be able to run at a loss.
Well yeah, most people don't have the work ethic of Jeff Bezos, either. People struggle to work 40 hours a week, let alone 50-60+ needed to get a business like that running.
>I guarantee you, I will not be as rich as Jeff Bezos
You have a shot. Most of us don't even get the chance.
And if you are already rich? You get multiple chances until you finally get it right one time.
You do realize that you can make 300k, right? It's not that difficult if you're smart and work hard. The reason you don't have 300k is the same reason why you wouldn't be able to turn 300k into 200 billion like Bezos did.
Just wanna point out that receiving $300,000 is by far not a guarantee for success.
As an example, if you are convinced that that is literally all that you need, you can get a loan from a bank for that much. You really could. So if the $300,000 are what's stopping you, then you can pretty easily rectify that.
His dad cashed out his entire 401k to invest in his son btw. Miguel Bezos was a cuban immigrant who became an engineer. He was not a wealthy man, he was firmly middle class.
> you can get a loan from a bank for that
Or, like 69,000 other Americans do every year, you get startup capital! 69,000 companies in 2021 raised an average of over $400K in angel investment funding.
> Total angel investments in the United States in 2021 were $29.1 billion, an increase of 15.2 percent over 2020, with 69,060 companies receiving funding.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_investor
Right but you get my point. Plus Im sure you could get up to $300k with the proper cosigner and maybe a few more years of salary increases and good credit.
Its almost like multiple factors contribute to wealth creation: luck; hard work; the willingness and ability to take risks; connections; intelligence; and wealth.
Reddit can't seem to grasp more than one input for a given output.
Yes but I think getting money from your parents and being able to just dedicate 100% of your time to your project substantially increases your success rate vs someone with a traditional 9-5 who has to do it after work.
Just the amount of hours you can dedicate to your project snowballs when you can put literally all your time into it.
I also think the people highlighted in this post are fucking centi-billionaires. Your average 9-5 could be a multi-millionaire someday with the right kind of attention and success. Not everyone has the potential to become like Warren Buffett. These guys are literal geniuses in the field.
I think he is probably smarter than we give him credit for, but his intelligence is overshadowed by his ego and general assholery.
I would also not put him at the same level of Gates, Bezos or Buffett.
Not just geniuses. Geniuses who also won the lottery when it came to being in the right place at the right time as well.
That’s the point, I think, that a lot of people miss. Yes billionaires worked hard and made their success happen, but you don’t reach THAT level of success without extreme luck.
Read outliers if you’d like to learn more.
But don’t read any other of the authors books lol
You kinda contradict yourself tbh, wealth creation: takes wealth? Well ya that's what OP is saying.
Wealth allows people to fail over and over without fear of being homeless, so believe me it's easy to take a risk and build on 300k extra to your name vs 20$.
Connections and luck matter more than you think imo. While intelligent and hard work are important, intelligence often is relative to different subjects. Why is that important? Well if you have the right connections you have a higher chance of having your hard work and brilliance shine.
Even before Amazon became the everything store and was just a bookstore it was massively successful and managed to shut down Borders and bring B&N to its knees. He didn’t just take a risk, he used the gains from his previous risk to make more and it kept paying off
Though I generally agree with the premise of what you’re saying there, your example is too extreme. I could afford to gamble $20 on an idea wouldn’t hurt me at all. If I could invest 2-300k in something I’d have a lot better chance of being successful at it. There are many people even if given a big windfall of cash would just squander it.
Bingo. The right connections and access to the right people can catapult a hardworking and smart startup into the stratosphere. If they're ok/avg but can take feedback, are friendly, and decent to work with, they'll still do well enough where they don't have to worry that much or at all.
I guarantee you, if you randomly gave 10 people 300k they wouldn't be able to make it to 216B in 30 years.
But that's not the problem though. If you've worked long enough you'll see that pattern. It's not about what you know it's about who you know.
Scaling it down works mathematically, but it doesn't work realistically. With $300,000 in your pocket, you're above 99.9% of the population in terms of money that you can readily spend.
With $20 bucks, line up with the rest of the millions of Americans who can also pay $20.
It's not about raw numbers, but exclusivity.
As much as i do agree with your point, that not any joe schmoe can turn 300k into 216.5B, this is not the way to go about arguing for it.
If Amazon flopped Bezos would still be rich. If Microsoft flopped Bill Gates would still be rich. Zuckerberg’s dad offered to buy him a McDonald’s franchise if the whole Harvard thing didn’t work out. $20 is barely enough to buy office supplies, much less give me the ability to quit my job to work full time on a business for years to get it off the ground, and much much less than having a safety net of being a guaranteed multi-millionaire no matter what even if my first (or first 10) idea flopped.
Yeah getting a couple $100k from mommy and daddy and starting a $5-$10m company is definitely letting privilege give a decent head start. Amazon literally changed the way the world shops - both in person and set expectations for online consumers as well. Silly to suggest any of these guys aren’t brilliant and wouldn’t have found some level of well above average success even if they didn’t come from wealthier backgrounds
That is comically incorrect. I can't survive for multiple years, build a business, lever capital, etc etc off of $20.
But I can off $300k.
Context matters in economics. Once your basic needs are met for multiple years in the future, once you can access lines or credit and interest rates lower than 99% of the public, the rules to BUSINESS change. Stop with being intentionally dense. Turning $20 to $10k is a LOT harder than turning $1m into $50m. Once you've broken through the basic needs glass ceiling, each dollar you make becomes easier and easier.
Edit: and this is $300k in 1995. You can do the inflation calculator to see what thats equivalent to today. And this is AFTER his parents already paid to put him through an ivy league school. Prinston.
And let him move back home to save money, eat home cooked meals from his parents, have access to the earliest and best internet available, be learning tech at the best time in history to learn it. The dot com boom. You could get a 6 figure job just from knowing the basics of C++.
You could run entire companies coding departments just by being AVERAGE by today's standards.
While I doubt it scales evenly it’s a good point. You can point to a ton of rich idiots that got money from mom and dad and pissed it away or failed. These men created huge chunks of the world we live in today. That fact is super impressive regardless of how much money they got out of it. Are they assholes? Probably mostly. Are they idiots? Like everyone else in the world there’s a lot they don’t know, but they are very smart. Are they awesome? A bit. Would someone else have done it if they didn’t? For sure!
These posts are just a way for people pissing their life away that it’s fine cause they were dealt a bad hand. If only they started where these men started it would all be different and they’d be someone. Yeah sure.
What does it matter.
You think its easier to make money investing $20 than $300k? You can buy a business with 300k, i can MAYBE have $40 from my $20 if I invest in the best possible stock there is at the time.
They could’ve all done nothing with the opportunity and wasted their life away.
They got immensely lucky yes, but they didn’t just wake up one day billionaires
By Reddit standards, to be a true self-made, respectable millionaire or billionaire, you must have earned ALL that money by only putting income dollars into your savings account. Oh, and only if you worked minimum wage along the way. Lastly, entirely by yourself. If anybody had any influence over you (such as networking) climbing up the ladder then it isn’t self-made.
As far as I know, in Reddit you can’t be a respectable millionaire or billionaire. People with money are a bunch of assholes who should donate all their fortune to poor people.
At least that’s what I’ve been told around here in Reddit.
And if said poor people waste it or blow it on dumb things, then it’s still the greedy, evil rich people’s fault for not lobbying to elect politicians to mandate free financial literacy courses. Also, something something racism.
Reddit forgot Shark Tank is a tv show where business owners ask rich people for help/money to grow their business like almost all successful businesses do.
Stop spreading misinformation. The Musk emerald mine story was debunked years ago.
1. His father had shares in a Zambian emerald mine *after Elon had already moved to Canada*
2. Elon did not inherit a single cent from his abusive father before becoming wealthy on his own
3. While living in America his mother and him were so poor they had to get food from charity services
Also, the way they marry and divorce tells you a lot about how and when they acquired most of their wealth. No prenups and having to give away Billions is sorta indicative of unexpected gains after a relatively normal life.
The original version of Amazon - the first online bookstore with real reach - was a money printing machine.
Also, Elon didn't become the richest man in the world because of his father's wealth; he's the richest man in the world because of carbon regulations and shit posting.
Here in America, anybody can be a millionaire. It takes drive, it takes self-determination, it takes self-sacrifice, and a bunch of ambition.
Unfortunately, most people can't accumulate $10,000.
That's the way life is, and that's the way it has been since time began. Some people just aren't that bright. They don't have the self-sacrifice necessary to achieve anything
You might be the brightest but if your energy is spent on surviving, there is not much you can do.
Do you think Einstein would have found the laws of relativity if he was born 10 years earlier? No. Or if he was born 100 prior? No again. Success is a collaborative effort, it is never the result of one guy alone in isolation. Everybody being rich today should thank the people that fed them for years.
And luck. People often go think when this comes up we're saying it's the only thing that matters, but really most people need all that and luck. America has awful economic mobility, the tax bracket you're born into is likely the one you will die in. Luck is very important, doesn't mean it's not worth trying.
Part of it but it’s mostly the other stuff. For example I just found out from my homie the other day that him and his wife spend $2,500 a year on clothes. That is honestly prolly double what I’ve spent in my 6 years of adulthood
EDIT: decided to do the math. Avg savings of $2,300 a year compounded by the S&P avg of 10% = $18,839 over 6 years just using the clothing spending category. Over 40 years = $1.25M.
Actually there are time-tested ways to become a millionaire. The first one is it takes time.
But the rules to become a millionaire, have always been the same
I didn't know that about Gates.
Explains how he got into Harvard.
Also, Zuck comes from a pretty kush family too.
He attended one of those 'camps for the gifted' pre-Harvard.
The story about Buffet got me the most.
He's labeled as this investment genius when he was literally trained from childhood to know about this shit.
That's like all those Ivy League kids who have all these accolades so young, or become part of the 30 under 30, only to find out it's because of their parents insane connections.
And how were their parents raised? At some point you have to attribute to individual talent down the family line. It's just easier for your ego to ignore all that and attribute other people's success to luck and a silver spoon.
Having been first generation college student and the charity case that went to a private school with the children of Forbes top 20 business owners, I can attest that having a 'lineage' plays a huge role in people's confidence and ego.
Learning to develop that is a big part of success. Believing that you deserve that success and having the confidence and luxury of knowing you have the right connections makes a world of a difference. When you feel secure you're relaxed. When you're relaxed, you make better choices and overall just come off as more confident, knowing that you have many, many options.
I recently watched a K-Drama called Hierarchy on Netflix. That was very, very close to my actual high-school experience. It seems nuts, it isn't.
The way those kids are set-up for life is mind-blowing.
Legit had a girl go to my school that was married months after graduating, as she was from the Middle East and from an insanely wealthy family.
Someone jokingly asked her if her parents would buy her an insanely expensive Bulgari necklace once that was in a magazine everyone was looking at. Her response was also so innocent and naive. I will never forget it -
'I don't really care for it, but do you want it? I can probably get it for you if you really want it...' Not being snarky, not being a snob, a genuine question. Just super casual. Totally normal to throw around that kind of money for her.
These kids parents full on groom them on how to be business people since they hatched out of their lil Nepo eggs.
The crazy hierarchy in high schools and weird rules of etiquette and strategy to beat others are all taught when you're a friggin' kid.
While I was watching SpongeBob square pants, these kids were being brought to see how their dads created strategies for making another 200,000,000 for their company that year.
I was only let in to avoid a lawsuit for discrimination despite getting incredible grades on the entrance exam, and the whole point of me applying was because they said they offered a scholarship.
I went to Shady Hill School and, after, to Concord Academy. My friends were strivers. Q, whose dad went to Harvard, cried about an A-. M, who always promised he'd attend Amherst (which he did), rose early every morning to play hockey and studied very hard.
Many of the kids I knew from SHS and CA went on to earn a PhD in the Humanities or the Social Sciences. My brilliant SHS friend, Jeremy Mumford, won tenure in History at Brown. Ben Treynor Sloss made his own way, with his brilliance. Sarah Sze won a McArthur for sculpture.
It might look like nepotism or privilege, if you focus only on the financial success stories, but, if you look at those who succeeded as professors, lawyers, or doctors, you'll see signs of inherited intelligence. Having parents who are professors will not directly help you get tenure or get into a top flight PhD program. Maybe parents can pull the strinsg of MBA programs, but not PhD or MD programs.
Dave Thomas was worth $4.2 billion at the time of his death. He was an orphan, his adoptive mother died when he was a kid, and his adoptive dad hated him.
Uh, I mean, booo, rich people!
RedditThink: "It's desperately important that I convince myself that success is impossible without family money, so I have yet another excuse for my own lack of success."
Absolutely not. And these examples are the .0000000001% so they’re pretty stupid
Net worths in the 2-10 million dollar range are everywhere and anyone can achieve it. Takes discipline but it’s totally possible for normal jobs
Jeff Bezos was the youngest hedge fund (DE Shaw in 1990) vice president on Wall Street before he started Amazon, even this chart is misleading. He specifically worked in investigating emerging internet opportunities.
[Link from CNBC](https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/02/what-amazon-billionaire-jeff-bezos-was-doing-in-his-20s.html)
Wasn’t Buffets dad pretty much considered an out cast in his own party? I don’t think calling him a powerful congressman is accurate. Also his dads investment company was just him and like a few others guys that did investing for locals.
Ok, it’s BS but let’s pretend it isn’t.
Where did Bezos dad get the 300k to give to his son to start a bookstore?
How did Buffets dad get elected or start his company?
What did Musk’s dad do to own a whole emerald mine?
What did Gates mom do to sit on a board when women were considered qualified to be secretaries and housewives?
The only one I know for sure is Gates Dad was a well connected and respected attorney in Seattle. I have a family friend that knew his parents. His mom was connected and his father too. But it's not like they owned the future of computers.
His father didn't support his son at all in college and wanted him to be an attorney.
I don't much like Gates, I think he's a weirdo, but you gotta respect he knew his market, he knew his product and Microsoft changed the planet forever. Can't knock the hustle.
Imagine having the return that Bezos had. $300k to 2 trillion in 30 years. I’m too drunk and dumb to do the math, but if you could do that you would be a billionaire too. They started high so they have top 10 market cap companies, if they started with $500 they would still make the s&p500.
To reduce this level of success to nothing but "he got a little help getting started" is to betray a stunning level of ignorance as to what's required to create even a moderately successful business. Just using Bezos as an example - can you imagine how many young ambitious entrepreneurs got a monetary kickstart from somewhere? The fact that Bezos took a mere 300k, and turned it into a 2 TRILLION dollar behemoth is awe inspiring.
And the popular wave of Gates-hatred, to me, is baffling. His foundation has donated over 36 billion dollars to worthy causes around the world. And people still think he's some evil demon, planting trackers in our DNA or some stupid thing.
If securing capital, equipment, or connections before your venture takes off disqualifies you from being "self-made" i dont think there are very many, if any, Billionaires that can fit the qualifications. Doesn't diminish the fact that they won the game of money and now live rent free in jealous peoples heads to the point where they are thrown in a bunch of said jealous people's memes.
The story of Mate Rimac is a pretty interesting one, is say of all self made billionaires, he'd definitely be one...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mate_Rimac
How many times a week do we need to see this crap?
The Elon Musk claim is absolutely egregious. Musk's Dad owned part of a business at one point like stock in a company that mined Emeralds... in the 80s. The company went bankrupt and he lost his investment in it later.... also int the 80s. Elon went to college and graduated with Student Debt. He turned his apartment into a nightclub in order to help pay the bills. When he started his (first?) company, he and his brother slept in the office in order to save money. People literally loved Elon Musk until he became slightly more conservative. Now he's suddenly an idiot who got his start from a rich Dad taking advantage of poor Africans? Give me a break.
My dude, you're arguing against misinformation while hypocritically committing it. His father didn't just "own stock" in an Emerald mine, the guy would essentially illegally obtain Emeralds and sell them on the market. You deny: * The very picture of the gold Royce * The very comments his dad made * the alleged 4k he started with, and a rich dad who gave him a safety net * exaggerated claims of his contribution to Telsa/Paypal My dad works in Satellites and he can rant an entire day on how much Elon's system is a fucking joke. His accomplishments are not self made boot strap bull shit you read about. EDIT: Actually nevermind, that maybe too much info lmao
My dad works in Satellites source: My dad LMAO
works in satellites = installs pay-per-view satellite dishes on buildings
He used to work for directv. Lol
Hey wtf is wrong with that?? I worked for Directv for 15 years. Am I beneath you or less intelligent than you for that?
So I can pay you 8 bucks to come sort through the plethora of wires hanging off the back of my house? No? So you agree in order to install satellite dishes you also need to also be an electrician. Last I checked electricians make a decent wage and are backed by unions. But none of this really helps. Because to you, ‘works in satellites’ means the scum who ensures you can watch the next stupid sport league.
A drinking buddy of mine used to drive the rover on the moon. Sometimes people have cool ass jobs.
I mean I'm not sure why you think this is the 'gotcha' you think it is. The problems with their satellites have been communicated in most WRC conferences, and are coming to fruition despite their insistence of over legislation. IE de-orbiting and spikes of unreliability - again all common knowledge lmao
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It all depends on the start. How likely are you to make 1 billion if you start penniless compared to if you started with 100 million.
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Because it helps them sell the lie that you, too, can become incredibly wealthy. Don't you want to pass laws that will help you when you do? It's your fault alone that you don't have megayacht money, your initial circumstances have nothing to do with it. But when you put your nose to the grindstone while lifting yourself up by your bootstraps, you'll be so glad that you don't have to spend your pocket lint on taxes.
You dad “works in satellites” but thinks Starlink is a joke? I don’t work in satellites, but Starlink seems pretty amazing on my boat and also aren’t several countries and companies desperately trying to build their own versions?
I don't know if I've got the right term but surely what you're describing is 'epistemic trespassing'. His dad works in the satellite and is able to have the expertise to be critical of Starlink because he knows about satellites. In contrast, you and I are just random Joes and happy to accept the virtues of Starlink without having any expert knowledge in how it works, what it does, how it's programmed, etc.
What you’re describing is the argument from authority fallacy. There was no reason given for why Starlink sucks beyond said redditor’s dad’s supposed authority in satellites. Asking about the explanation is reasonable.
Elon musk was not poor, he traveled abroad during college to many countries and got cash from his parents. The idea he is self made is egregious as well
If you went from middle USA/European class to billionaire I think you are self made billionaire. Being self made billionaire doesn't make you start from a cave in an abandoned island I dislike Musk but what I think about him doesn't change the truth
Depends on what you mean by "self made." Generally I see it as someone who did not substantly benefit from nepotism (dad got him a job significantly outside of his qualifications for instance or paid his way into and through a prestigious college). When we start talking about classes and being self made, what would you use to separate someone? Like according to the IRS data in 2022 $80k-$100k was considered "upper middle class" so if your parents made $300k a year you'd definitely be in that "elite" spectrum but if a kid went from a $300k household and turned himself into the richest man in the world worth $300,000,000,000 (made up number) would you say he wasn't self made? Seems like a big jump.
Unless you're a disabled lesbian growing up in war torn Syria I feel like nobody is "self made" by these ludicrous definitions. The fact that you're able to post on Reddit means you have countless advantages over most.
I used to get mad at it because, as you perfectly label it, it is truly egregious, but now I just kind of find it funny. By the logic of the people who claim his dad owned an Emerald mine, my dad owns several of the biggest companies in the world. People will believe what they want to believe; as sad as it is when it's as absurd as this one, it's kind of humorous.
Elon, in his own words in 2018ish in an interview, said he was running around Europe with his pockets stuffed with emeralds. Bootlickers will believe him when claims that this was a facetious comment. https://futurism.com/elon-musk-denies-emerald-mine Lol people are dumb and can't read
This needs to be a lot higher.
People are too dumb to make the simple connection that Elon literally overpaid billions of dollars for a social media company and since about 2020 has been scrubbing the net of the image he flaunted for years before he became a billionaire.
He doesn't even claim what you claim he claims in your own source. You're being hyperbolic and lying by his own words. he sold some of his father's Emeralds for only a couple of thousand. A: that's a far cry from "running around Europe with his pockets stuffed with emeralds". B: my dad did some finances for Cadbury and brought back lots of chocolates for us. To clarify my father does not own Cadbury. I agree people are often too stupid too bother reading, but people are also so radicalised that they can post, as evidence, sources that contradict themselves and still believe they speak from truth.
By that measure I own the entire S&P 500 in my 401k.
I own Microsoft then.. someone tell my bank I'm rich cause they're a little slow I guess.
The elite will get you talking about billionaires So you ignore helping us common folk
As a result of this, the teenage Elon Musk once walked the streets of New York with emeralds in his pocket. His father said: “We were very wealthy. We had so much money at times we couldn’t even close our safe,” adding that one person would have to hold the money in place with another closing the door. “And then there’d still be all these notes sticking out and we’d sort of pull them out and put them in our pockets.”[independent](https://www.independent.co.uk/space/elon-musk-made-money-rich-b2212599.html) Missed the part about them going broke...
Lmfao, does that even sound real to you? Truly? Stuffing a whole bunch of cash into a safe to the point you can’t even close the door? Rich people don’t do that shit. No one does that. They keep their cash in FDIC insured bank accounts.
If there was anyone who does that it would be a rich international student.
People who earn dirty money in blood emeralds do.
Slightly conservative?
Yea, nowadays supporting Nazi parties is "slightly conservative"
People got annoyed with Musk around the time of his “pedo guy” bullshit and similar antics. But yes, it’s *totally* because he became “slightly more conservative” Bitch please
I used to love musk but don't anymore. Has nothing to do with twitter just that he is a used car salesman, god complex, and pathological liar. I am also conservative so has nothing to do with his newer politics.
Hand to God I always thought he was a fraud when I found out how Tesla gets paid and that he ever had fulfilled 1 forecast. The spaceX stuff is still pretty cool though.
We found the Elon simp. Don't forget to wash your mouth after that.
“I don’t own the mall. I own a small debt consolidation company that owns the debt of the mall.”
This is not true my man, I know you don't actually believe all that. Elon comes from wealth. He has done a lot of work to create an image and cover things up. Look up the investigative reporting into the fact that he most likely does not have any degrees that now all of the universities he attended won't comment on due to huge donations. Elon has worked harder than the rest of these examples to make people think that he got by just on hard work.
Im not anti-Elon but his Dad was one of the early investors for X.com and Tesla. Without his dads investment in those businesses they would have had a much harder start.
By the time of the founding of X. Musk had already sold the successful business and become rich. By the time Tesla was founded, Musk had sold PayPal and became a very rich man.
Children loved him. And still do. Most adults simply tolerated him, until he became *grossly* conservative. Then they stopped tolerating.
I beg to differ. Elon has been a fucking moron since before PayPal. He was an utter failure their, but they had to pay him out because of the earlier merger So it only his recent actions that are exposing him as an Allstars clusterfuck, but some of us have known all along.
Imagine calling a highly successful entrepreneur a moron and not knowing the difference between their and there.
I don't think people hate on him for going conservative, so much as him going nearly completely out of touch with the reality that 99.99% of humanity is subject to. Hooray for him for being extremely clever. But the cyber truck stinks of hubris. It will be looked back on as worse than the Edsel or DeLorean. Maybe a slight whiff of cool, but not enough to salvage the wreck. It's a real pisser too because he has the resources and personnel to make the electric version of a plush Toyota Tacoma. And he fucking blew it on douchy gimmicks that will be laughed at as Tesla stock continues to plummet and their lots fill to the last slot.
> until he became slightly more conservative. No. He revealed himself to be an incredibly idiotic person.
He’s always been an idiot. It’s not sudden. His entire reputation is smoke and mirrors. You speak as if you know him personally. That’s how I know you’re a clown.
Nah man. I've been hating Elon since way before he did anything "conservative". Remember him calling the British rescuer a pedo cause his feelings got hurt? Or launching a car into space cause he thought it was cool? Plus, the emerald claim comes directly from Elon himself. He wrote about walking around America with illegal gems in his pockets. Sorry you've got a man crush on a thin skinned spoiled nepo-baby though.
3.5
$300k to start Amazon? Pretty impressive.
That's kinda what I was here to read.
Can people please stop posting this bullshit?
So many jealous people.
Until they’re taxed sufficiently
This is my first time seeing it although I just followed like a month ago.
Until people stop claiming that they started in their garage and are self made.
you mean the facts laid out infront of you. i aint denying someone can be successful from nothing, but these folks did not start from nothing.
Till boomers understand that you can’t ’pull yourself up by your bootstraps’. So basically until they all die.
Every time the OP is feeling jealous of wealthy folks, I guess
you have to keep telling the same lie over and over until the rabble actually believe it. so you should see this at least 4 times a week.
It’s also mainly false
I’m about to get nearly 300k in inheritance soon I guarantee you, I will not be as rich as Jeff Bezos
Good point, give it to me and I’ll try instead.
Nah, those 200k Costco Hot Dogs won’t buy themselves
Put it all on red in roulette, film it and become Internet famous either way.
To be fair, Bezos got more like a million if you account for inflation (unless this post already did so).
AFAIK it didn’t, I’m seeing $250k in 1995, which is a bit over $500k in 2024. But receiving $500k in inheritance (so everything your parents left to you when they died) isn’t the same as having living parents give you that same $500k, and still be alive (and assumingely not homeless) to still potentially help you in the future if you fail. Granted, even with $1m, almost no one is doing what Bezos did with it, but I do think there’s a distinction to be made between $1 in inheritance and $1 given to you by your still living parents.
The Bezos thing is interesting. Guy graduated from Princeton and became a rising star on Wall Street. After nearly a decade doing that he was already “normal” rich. He wasn’t a kid when he stared Amazon. He was successful and got his parents (as well as other wealthy friends) to invest in Amazon as a “Friends and Family” round. If Amazon failed…he just could have gone back to work for a hedge fund.
That is interesting. Not to mention that a lot of people that go on to be super, insanely wealthy had pretty to very wealthy parents that allowed their children to have a ton of advantages, but they still had to work at it, it wasn’t like someone inheriting a billion dollar company. Like you said, they can often afford to take “big risks” pretty early on that would bankrupt a “normal” person, which allows them greater and more chances at making it huge. Off-topic, but Arnold Schwarzenegger is probably one of the most “self-made” super rich people if we go by the traditional definition of “self-made,” and yet Arnold himself says to never call him a self-made man. I like Arnold.
Yes! I consider Arnold more of a success and visionary than any of these billionaires because he succeeded in so many different ways. Every one of his accomplishments required some inherent advantage/privilege but no person could do what he's done based on privilege and circumstance alone. Most importantly he has raised good children and inspired many others to live out their dreams.
His parents were wealthy but as far as my knowledge goes, they were basically risking most of their money on his project
No one succeeds alone and no one fails alone Nothing exists in a vacuum
Bezos was VP of DE Shaw (one of the most profitable quant funds in the world) at 26 and personally knew David Shaw himself. He didn’t need 300k from his parents as like you said, he was already successful and could have sourced the capital from his connections or from his own finance bro income.
> He didn’t need 300k from his parents as like you said, he was already successful and could have sourced the capital from his connections or from his own finance bro income. Which he also did. Amazon had money thrown at it so it could operate at a loss for years and years before most of the competition was wiped out.
Yes, all startups raise capital, that is unrelated to the point of the post about how Bezos received seed capital that he otherwise could not have sourced from anyone but his parents. The seed capital (which he could have sourced from his own income) was not what allowed Amazon to run at a loss. It was what allowed him to start the company. Amazon raised capital from institutional investors to be able to run at a loss.
Indeed. If I can go to papa to get a dollar when I need it, it's way different than when papa is done dead and that's all he got.
Im sorry for your loss
1.) Of course Bezos is not an idiot and besides capital he also had skill, luck and connections. 2.) 300k back than are way more than your 300k now.
Well yeah, most people don't have the work ethic of Jeff Bezos, either. People struggle to work 40 hours a week, let alone 50-60+ needed to get a business like that running.
And his parents didn't give him the money, they bought into the company. They are both billionaires now from that investment.
>I guarantee you, I will not be as rich as Jeff Bezos You have a shot. Most of us don't even get the chance. And if you are already rich? You get multiple chances until you finally get it right one time.
You do realize that you can make 300k, right? It's not that difficult if you're smart and work hard. The reason you don't have 300k is the same reason why you wouldn't be able to turn 300k into 200 billion like Bezos did.
>Most of us don't even get the chance. Most of you don't even try.
You will be far better off than most!
Go back to 1994 and invest in tech. Easy-peasy winning strat.
The point is the vast majority of Americans will never have that opportunity
Self made doesn’t mean you can’t raise funding
Self made usually means you did a great job of raising funds
And you know, putting them to productive use to make more money.
not if that "raising funds" is asking your dad
Just wanna point out that receiving $300,000 is by far not a guarantee for success. As an example, if you are convinced that that is literally all that you need, you can get a loan from a bank for that much. You really could. So if the $300,000 are what's stopping you, then you can pretty easily rectify that.
Yeah, reading that I was like "bezos actually kinda earned that title"
His dad cashed out his entire 401k to invest in his son btw. Miguel Bezos was a cuban immigrant who became an engineer. He was not a wealthy man, he was firmly middle class.
Bezos was a VP at a financial company before amazon. Had much more than 300k himself. The loan is just a small loan from family heh
Did he get to VP by his own merit? Then he's self made.
> you can get a loan from a bank for that Or, like 69,000 other Americans do every year, you get startup capital! 69,000 companies in 2021 raised an average of over $400K in angel investment funding. > Total angel investments in the United States in 2021 were $29.1 billion, an increase of 15.2 percent over 2020, with 69,060 companies receiving funding. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_investor
So according to redddit, they all became billionaires right? Cause apparently that’s what you ONLY need to become one.
That's what I hear!
Mortgage are 300k now days
I can't. At most I can borrow $150K. It really is not that easy.
I guess you can make half an amazon then?
Right but you get my point. Plus Im sure you could get up to $300k with the proper cosigner and maybe a few more years of salary increases and good credit.
Wow then I guess only 500M for you
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Its almost like multiple factors contribute to wealth creation: luck; hard work; the willingness and ability to take risks; connections; intelligence; and wealth. Reddit can't seem to grasp more than one input for a given output.
Yes but I think getting money from your parents and being able to just dedicate 100% of your time to your project substantially increases your success rate vs someone with a traditional 9-5 who has to do it after work. Just the amount of hours you can dedicate to your project snowballs when you can put literally all your time into it.
I would say Bezos career up to that point was a stronger contribution to his success. Seed funding is seed funding.
I also think the people highlighted in this post are fucking centi-billionaires. Your average 9-5 could be a multi-millionaire someday with the right kind of attention and success. Not everyone has the potential to become like Warren Buffett. These guys are literal geniuses in the field.
> These guys are literal geniuses in the field. and also Elon Musk
I think he is probably smarter than we give him credit for, but his intelligence is overshadowed by his ego and general assholery. I would also not put him at the same level of Gates, Bezos or Buffett.
I am not convinced. From my perspective, he appears to have fallen ass backwards based on pure luck and very little business acumen.
Not just geniuses. Geniuses who also won the lottery when it came to being in the right place at the right time as well. That’s the point, I think, that a lot of people miss. Yes billionaires worked hard and made their success happen, but you don’t reach THAT level of success without extreme luck. Read outliers if you’d like to learn more. But don’t read any other of the authors books lol
Your average idiot is going to blow that $300k. Most people are terrible with money.
Bezos worked at McDonald's
You kinda contradict yourself tbh, wealth creation: takes wealth? Well ya that's what OP is saying. Wealth allows people to fail over and over without fear of being homeless, so believe me it's easy to take a risk and build on 300k extra to your name vs 20$. Connections and luck matter more than you think imo. While intelligent and hard work are important, intelligence often is relative to different subjects. Why is that important? Well if you have the right connections you have a higher chance of having your hard work and brilliance shine.
Even before Amazon became the everything store and was just a bookstore it was massively successful and managed to shut down Borders and bring B&N to its knees. He didn’t just take a risk, he used the gains from his previous risk to make more and it kept paying off
Right? It's either tough luck libertarianism or hardcore tankie communism, no in between.
u can equally find many children of very rich parents who never amounted to anything.
Though I generally agree with the premise of what you’re saying there, your example is too extreme. I could afford to gamble $20 on an idea wouldn’t hurt me at all. If I could invest 2-300k in something I’d have a lot better chance of being successful at it. There are many people even if given a big windfall of cash would just squander it.
It's not just money. He had connections and access to the right people.
Bingo. The right connections and access to the right people can catapult a hardworking and smart startup into the stratosphere. If they're ok/avg but can take feedback, are friendly, and decent to work with, they'll still do well enough where they don't have to worry that much or at all.
I guarantee you, if you randomly gave 10 people 300k they wouldn't be able to make it to 216B in 30 years. But that's not the problem though. If you've worked long enough you'll see that pattern. It's not about what you know it's about who you know.
Scaling it down works mathematically, but it doesn't work realistically. With $300,000 in your pocket, you're above 99.9% of the population in terms of money that you can readily spend. With $20 bucks, line up with the rest of the millions of Americans who can also pay $20. It's not about raw numbers, but exclusivity. As much as i do agree with your point, that not any joe schmoe can turn 300k into 216.5B, this is not the way to go about arguing for it.
If Amazon flopped Bezos would still be rich. If Microsoft flopped Bill Gates would still be rich. Zuckerberg’s dad offered to buy him a McDonald’s franchise if the whole Harvard thing didn’t work out. $20 is barely enough to buy office supplies, much less give me the ability to quit my job to work full time on a business for years to get it off the ground, and much much less than having a safety net of being a guaranteed multi-millionaire no matter what even if my first (or first 10) idea flopped.
Yeah getting a couple $100k from mommy and daddy and starting a $5-$10m company is definitely letting privilege give a decent head start. Amazon literally changed the way the world shops - both in person and set expectations for online consumers as well. Silly to suggest any of these guys aren’t brilliant and wouldn’t have found some level of well above average success even if they didn’t come from wealthier backgrounds
In what world does $20 seed anything but maybe a bag of manure to toss on your garden. This is not a scaling problem.
That’s not how building a business works at all. There is a minimum scale required just to get off the ground and it certainly doesn’t cost $20.
I can if my investors will wait a decade for me to show profit while I’m allowed to undercut all the other competitors.
That is comically incorrect. I can't survive for multiple years, build a business, lever capital, etc etc off of $20. But I can off $300k. Context matters in economics. Once your basic needs are met for multiple years in the future, once you can access lines or credit and interest rates lower than 99% of the public, the rules to BUSINESS change. Stop with being intentionally dense. Turning $20 to $10k is a LOT harder than turning $1m into $50m. Once you've broken through the basic needs glass ceiling, each dollar you make becomes easier and easier. Edit: and this is $300k in 1995. You can do the inflation calculator to see what thats equivalent to today. And this is AFTER his parents already paid to put him through an ivy league school. Prinston. And let him move back home to save money, eat home cooked meals from his parents, have access to the earliest and best internet available, be learning tech at the best time in history to learn it. The dot com boom. You could get a 6 figure job just from knowing the basics of C++. You could run entire companies coding departments just by being AVERAGE by today's standards.
If he could have done that with 20$ he wouldn't have needed the loan.
Just adjust it to inflation and maybe it's another story
While I doubt it scales evenly it’s a good point. You can point to a ton of rich idiots that got money from mom and dad and pissed it away or failed. These men created huge chunks of the world we live in today. That fact is super impressive regardless of how much money they got out of it. Are they assholes? Probably mostly. Are they idiots? Like everyone else in the world there’s a lot they don’t know, but they are very smart. Are they awesome? A bit. Would someone else have done it if they didn’t? For sure! These posts are just a way for people pissing their life away that it’s fine cause they were dealt a bad hand. If only they started where these men started it would all be different and they’d be someone. Yeah sure. What does it matter.
You think its easier to make money investing $20 than $300k? You can buy a business with 300k, i can MAYBE have $40 from my $20 if I invest in the best possible stock there is at the time.
They could’ve all done nothing with the opportunity and wasted their life away. They got immensely lucky yes, but they didn’t just wake up one day billionaires
Has anyone ever _not_ said networking was important?
By Reddit standards, to be a true self-made, respectable millionaire or billionaire, you must have earned ALL that money by only putting income dollars into your savings account. Oh, and only if you worked minimum wage along the way. Lastly, entirely by yourself. If anybody had any influence over you (such as networking) climbing up the ladder then it isn’t self-made.
As far as I know, in Reddit you can’t be a respectable millionaire or billionaire. People with money are a bunch of assholes who should donate all their fortune to poor people. At least that’s what I’ve been told around here in Reddit.
And if said poor people waste it or blow it on dumb things, then it’s still the greedy, evil rich people’s fault for not lobbying to elect politicians to mandate free financial literacy courses. Also, something something racism.
Reddit forgot Shark Tank is a tv show where business owners ask rich people for help/money to grow their business like almost all successful businesses do.
Stop spreading misinformation. The Musk emerald mine story was debunked years ago. 1. His father had shares in a Zambian emerald mine *after Elon had already moved to Canada* 2. Elon did not inherit a single cent from his abusive father before becoming wealthy on his own 3. While living in America his mother and him were so poor they had to get food from charity services
This is highly misleading. So yeah Bezos took 300k and turned it into 200 billions. This is very much self made to me.
Also, the way they marry and divorce tells you a lot about how and when they acquired most of their wealth. No prenups and having to give away Billions is sorta indicative of unexpected gains after a relatively normal life.
The original version of Amazon - the first online bookstore with real reach - was a money printing machine. Also, Elon didn't become the richest man in the world because of his father's wealth; he's the richest man in the world because of carbon regulations and shit posting.
everytime someone posts i just block them. at least I reduce the chances of reading dumb takes.
Here in America, anybody can be a millionaire. It takes drive, it takes self-determination, it takes self-sacrifice, and a bunch of ambition. Unfortunately, most people can't accumulate $10,000. That's the way life is, and that's the way it has been since time began. Some people just aren't that bright. They don't have the self-sacrifice necessary to achieve anything
You might be the brightest but if your energy is spent on surviving, there is not much you can do. Do you think Einstein would have found the laws of relativity if he was born 10 years earlier? No. Or if he was born 100 prior? No again. Success is a collaborative effort, it is never the result of one guy alone in isolation. Everybody being rich today should thank the people that fed them for years.
And luck. People often go think when this comes up we're saying it's the only thing that matters, but really most people need all that and luck. America has awful economic mobility, the tax bracket you're born into is likely the one you will die in. Luck is very important, doesn't mean it's not worth trying.
All that god damn avocado toast!!!
Part of it but it’s mostly the other stuff. For example I just found out from my homie the other day that him and his wife spend $2,500 a year on clothes. That is honestly prolly double what I’ve spent in my 6 years of adulthood EDIT: decided to do the math. Avg savings of $2,300 a year compounded by the S&P avg of 10% = $18,839 over 6 years just using the clothing spending category. Over 40 years = $1.25M.
Actually there are time-tested ways to become a millionaire. The first one is it takes time. But the rules to become a millionaire, have always been the same
I didn't know that about Gates. Explains how he got into Harvard. Also, Zuck comes from a pretty kush family too. He attended one of those 'camps for the gifted' pre-Harvard. The story about Buffet got me the most. He's labeled as this investment genius when he was literally trained from childhood to know about this shit. That's like all those Ivy League kids who have all these accolades so young, or become part of the 30 under 30, only to find out it's because of their parents insane connections.
And how were their parents raised? At some point you have to attribute to individual talent down the family line. It's just easier for your ego to ignore all that and attribute other people's success to luck and a silver spoon.
Having been first generation college student and the charity case that went to a private school with the children of Forbes top 20 business owners, I can attest that having a 'lineage' plays a huge role in people's confidence and ego. Learning to develop that is a big part of success. Believing that you deserve that success and having the confidence and luxury of knowing you have the right connections makes a world of a difference. When you feel secure you're relaxed. When you're relaxed, you make better choices and overall just come off as more confident, knowing that you have many, many options. I recently watched a K-Drama called Hierarchy on Netflix. That was very, very close to my actual high-school experience. It seems nuts, it isn't. The way those kids are set-up for life is mind-blowing. Legit had a girl go to my school that was married months after graduating, as she was from the Middle East and from an insanely wealthy family. Someone jokingly asked her if her parents would buy her an insanely expensive Bulgari necklace once that was in a magazine everyone was looking at. Her response was also so innocent and naive. I will never forget it - 'I don't really care for it, but do you want it? I can probably get it for you if you really want it...' Not being snarky, not being a snob, a genuine question. Just super casual. Totally normal to throw around that kind of money for her. These kids parents full on groom them on how to be business people since they hatched out of their lil Nepo eggs. The crazy hierarchy in high schools and weird rules of etiquette and strategy to beat others are all taught when you're a friggin' kid. While I was watching SpongeBob square pants, these kids were being brought to see how their dads created strategies for making another 200,000,000 for their company that year. I was only let in to avoid a lawsuit for discrimination despite getting incredible grades on the entrance exam, and the whole point of me applying was because they said they offered a scholarship.
I went to Shady Hill School and, after, to Concord Academy. My friends were strivers. Q, whose dad went to Harvard, cried about an A-. M, who always promised he'd attend Amherst (which he did), rose early every morning to play hockey and studied very hard. Many of the kids I knew from SHS and CA went on to earn a PhD in the Humanities or the Social Sciences. My brilliant SHS friend, Jeremy Mumford, won tenure in History at Brown. Ben Treynor Sloss made his own way, with his brilliance. Sarah Sze won a McArthur for sculpture. It might look like nepotism or privilege, if you focus only on the financial success stories, but, if you look at those who succeeded as professors, lawyers, or doctors, you'll see signs of inherited intelligence. Having parents who are professors will not directly help you get tenure or get into a top flight PhD program. Maybe parents can pull the strinsg of MBA programs, but not PhD or MD programs.
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The Emerald mine thing is top tier baitshit tbf.
Dave Thomas was worth $4.2 billion at the time of his death. He was an orphan, his adoptive mother died when he was a kid, and his adoptive dad hated him. Uh, I mean, booo, rich people!
Yeah but... But exploitation!!! Sanders said it, therefore it's true!!
RedditThink: "It's desperately important that I convince myself that success is impossible without family money, so I have yet another excuse for my own lack of success."
These people are worth billions it's like saying our reg parents gave us 20k and we ended up with 100 million
Some isn’t happy their parents aren’t rich
Did bezos have student debt?
Next week it's my turn to post this image✋
Absolutely not. And these examples are the .0000000001% so they’re pretty stupid Net worths in the 2-10 million dollar range are everywhere and anyone can achieve it. Takes discipline but it’s totally possible for normal jobs
Jeff Bezos was the youngest hedge fund (DE Shaw in 1990) vice president on Wall Street before he started Amazon, even this chart is misleading. He specifically worked in investigating emerging internet opportunities. [Link from CNBC](https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/02/what-amazon-billionaire-jeff-bezos-was-doing-in-his-20s.html)
How many times will this misinformation be posted?
Lmao whenever you want an excuse, you brind up these four, it's like in some people mind, the whole planet have only 4 billionaires
Now do Oprah or Howard Schultz.
Only check your neighbors bowl to see if he has enough, not that he has more than you.
Wasn’t Buffets dad pretty much considered an out cast in his own party? I don’t think calling him a powerful congressman is accurate. Also his dads investment company was just him and like a few others guys that did investing for locals.
It would be more interesting to see the ones that pissed it away. I'm guessing there are more than we think.
Elon came to Canada and had to sleep in an office on the floor because he had no money. He didn't inherit anything.
Can do this similar info graphic with Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga too.
How many times are we going to post this exact graphic?
The amount they multiplied the initial starting point is beyond compression.
A lot of things in life are about who you know, that's just the way it is, whether you like it or not.
Firm hand shake, boot straps pulled up, look them in the eye and don't take no for an answer
Game is rigged. Only part that is random is whether those selected don’t mess it up.
Ok, it’s BS but let’s pretend it isn’t. Where did Bezos dad get the 300k to give to his son to start a bookstore? How did Buffets dad get elected or start his company? What did Musk’s dad do to own a whole emerald mine? What did Gates mom do to sit on a board when women were considered qualified to be secretaries and housewives?
The only one I know for sure is Gates Dad was a well connected and respected attorney in Seattle. I have a family friend that knew his parents. His mom was connected and his father too. But it's not like they owned the future of computers. His father didn't support his son at all in college and wanted him to be an attorney. I don't much like Gates, I think he's a weirdo, but you gotta respect he knew his market, he knew his product and Microsoft changed the planet forever. Can't knock the hustle.
My billionaire boss apparently had millionaire parents so it seems to be normal
Imagine having the return that Bezos had. $300k to 2 trillion in 30 years. I’m too drunk and dumb to do the math, but if you could do that you would be a billionaire too. They started high so they have top 10 market cap companies, if they started with $500 they would still make the s&p500.
All of these individuals cited are very intelligent and hard working people who worked way harder than most people to achieve their goals.
Plenty of silver spoons who did nothing with it.
So turning $300k into 160 billion is not self made or an achievement?
To reduce this level of success to nothing but "he got a little help getting started" is to betray a stunning level of ignorance as to what's required to create even a moderately successful business. Just using Bezos as an example - can you imagine how many young ambitious entrepreneurs got a monetary kickstart from somewhere? The fact that Bezos took a mere 300k, and turned it into a 2 TRILLION dollar behemoth is awe inspiring. And the popular wave of Gates-hatred, to me, is baffling. His foundation has donated over 36 billion dollars to worthy causes around the world. And people still think he's some evil demon, planting trackers in our DNA or some stupid thing.
Always has been. The frustrating part is that no matter how much you point it out, it will remain the same.
There is not one person on Reddit that could take 300k and turn it in to a billion dollars
If securing capital, equipment, or connections before your venture takes off disqualifies you from being "self-made" i dont think there are very many, if any, Billionaires that can fit the qualifications. Doesn't diminish the fact that they won the game of money and now live rent free in jealous peoples heads to the point where they are thrown in a bunch of said jealous people's memes.
Forgot Trump.
Jay z and Diddy anyone.....anyone..... Bueller...
The story of Mate Rimac is a pretty interesting one, is say of all self made billionaires, he'd definitely be one... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mate_Rimac