Sorry, but that just reeks of blaming poor people for their lot in life. Exceptional people will mostly make it out on top regardless of where they start. But the vast majority of us are not exceptional and we should not use them as examples of what we all could potentially achieve if only we worked hard and stayed the course. I have worked for everything I have but I will not ignore how well my parents set me up to be successful. You talk about equality of opportunity but every child in America certainly does not have equal knowledge of these opportunities much less equal access. We like to pretend there isn’t a caste system in the U.S. but there is.