> I have a really hard time believing someone else's fortune means that I cannot also be fortunate

I don’t. There is a limited amount of wealth in the economy at any given moment. There is also a limited amount of well-paying jobs, which can lead to social mobility, and there is also a limited amount of wealth for investing in new ventures. Since these things are finite, one person being 20x richer than you or me means they are sitting on money and taking opportunities that others cannot. Time and money are not infinite because Earth’s resources are not infinite.

And yes, Zach Dell alone being wealthy or taking a lucrative job does not substantively affect everyone’s wealth. He is just one person. But I hope you can realize that the author is employing a literary device known as an anecdote or an example to start off their piece in order to illustrate a larger issue, which is that the wealthy are able to get opportunities and more wealth just by virtue of what family they were born into. Whether this is a problem or not is up to you, but I think reducing the article to “overtones of jealously” and “mediocracy” is misleading, although in an unintentionally amusing way; the author is actually calling out the blatant “mediocracy” that is inherent to privilege in our so-called merit-based society. I think this is a valid issue to write about and discuss.

Bold claim for a person with potable running water, internet access, flushable toilets and living above the poverty line.

That’s a pretty low bar in a world where a handful of people have literally hundreds (if not more) of times the amount of wealth as you and I, and yet still a significant portion of Americans live below or near the poverty line. I contend, not unreasonably, that we can do better than internet access, drinkable water, and other basic necessities of post-industrial living and still have plenty of inequality to make rich people feel superior or whatever. The U.S. economy is tremendously more productive than it was even 20 years ago, but have wages and prosperity risen proportionately among the lower and middle classes over that timespan? No. Yet wealthy children are able to exploit their privilege to get positions that “ladder climbers” could have gotten.

But yes, let us thank our benevolent masters, who throw pennies from their high castles at us commoners as we bow and scrape for their favor. Nothing to see here, folks, poor children get potable water and rich children get seven figure salaries! What inequality and nepotism do you speak of?

I can only imagine how much more charitable you would be with his level of wealth, given how charitable you are with the _literal vast expanse_ of your current.

People online need to be more like you. I appreciate your thoughtful response to my comment, as well as your willingness to discuss this issue in good faith so far