It only seems that way. Sometimes being manipulative is easier than trying to excel (otherwise we'd see more people doing well

But in order to keep that person you have to make a chaotic environment. Who wants to deliberately have crushing debt?

It's more like if you're already a loser, you can use some of that to your advantage by dragging someone else down with you.

But a lot less ability!

Manipulative people are highly optimized for it. Like the way your graphics card can do matrix operations without breaking a sweat that would bring your main processor to its knees.

Depends on your talents.