Viral Thread Busts The Myth About Famous Billionaires Starting Out “Poor” Interview With Author
We all love stories about scrappy underdogs who overcome the odds and make it big through relentless hard work, unwavering grit, and sheer force of will. However, the stories about how some of the richest and most powerful people made their millions (and billions) are too romanticized and gloss over some very important details.
That’s the point that Aidan Smith made in a viral Twitter thread where he explained how Jeff Bezos and others had a huge leg-up when it came to helping lay the foundations of their business empires. Namely—having families with lots of money.
Aidan told Bored Panda that the US isn’t the only country where a lot of people believe myths about businessmen while the truth is a Google search away. “It’s far from a U.S.-exclusive phenomenon, but in America, it’s easier for most people to imagine becoming a billionaire themselves than it is to imagine an economic order in which a handful of people own half the world’s wealth. Social mobility from working-class to middle-class is increasingly out of reach and the illusion that one can conceivably amass a net worth of over a billion dollars is a comforting fantasy for many people.” Scroll down for the rest of the interview.
Jon Erlichman posted how Jeff Bezos founded Amazon in his garage, suggesting that he was a self-made billionaire
Image credits: JonErlichman
Image credits: JonErlichman
However, Aidan Smith pointed out that Bezos’ parents invested more than 245k dollars into Amazon to help him out
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Aidan then went on to explain how other famous billionaires had a lot of help because they had wealthy and powerful family members. Here’s what he said about Bill Gates
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
This is what Aidan said about Warren Buffett
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Mark Zuckerberg might not be who he is today without the expensive tuition he received
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Aidan then talked about the Waltons and the Kochs
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
Not to mention how Kylie Jenner is far from the self-made billionaire some claim her to be
Image credits: AidanSmith2020
The moral of the story is that people shouldn’t beat themselves up for being poor because a lot of very successful people had financial help and support
Aidan told us that he has a decent-sized following and is used to his posts going moderately viral. “But I’m pleasantly surprised by how much of an impact this tweet in particular had.”
According to him, believing that certain famous billionaires are self-made when they might not be is harmful for a variety of reasons. “For one, even in the rare cases in which people from working-class backgrounds amass exorbitant wealth, it’s still not ‘self-made’ given that amassing wealth on that scale will always have come from ruthless exploitation of others.”
While Bezos may have started Amazon in his parents’ garage when he was 30, people tend to focus on this part, not the fact that his parents invested 245,573 dollars in Amazon in 1995, nor that Bezos worked in Wall Street before committing to Amazon.
Bloomberg found that if Bezos’ parents kept all of their holdings in the company, their shares would have been worth around 30 billion dollars in 2018.
As of now, it’s unclear how much of the stock Jackie and Mike Bezos still own. They could secretly be among the world’s wealthiest 30 people (possibly even ahead of Elon Musk at the time).
Bezos and others might be successful, talented, dedicated, and not afraid to take risks (nobody is trying to diminish their accomplishments or effort) but they’re not entirely self-made.
Aidan’s thread definitely got the internet’s attention: it got more than 489k likes, nearly 150k retweets, and started a discussion.
Some people were surprised to learn some of the things that Aidan shared on Twitter. Others fully agreed with his message. Meanwhile, some Twitter users questioned why people are getting upset at people becoming successful, even if they did use their parents’ money. To which some internet users responded that fake underdog stories lead to poor people being told it’s their own fault for not becoming rich.
People had different opinions after reading Aidan’s posts. Some thought that success is success no matter what while others agreed with Aidan’s ideas
Image credits: Landoooo15
Image credits: _txniz
Image credits: AcmeDarryl
Image credits: Mitochondria95
Image credits: GDGivens
Image credits: d_veebee
Image credits: masonfl
Image credits: David_MuellerMO
Image credits: ocgeorge_
Image credits: AndBuyWolfCola
Image credits: maskedwinemaker
Image credits: MallowyGoodness
The point seems to have gone over some of the head of those responding. He is not saying that it is not smart to flip a quarter million into a billion, what he is saying is that people who really are "self made", who really came from "nothing"....do not have parents that can afford to give them hundreds of thousands of dollars!! They do not have parents that own homes with large garages to practice tinkering on computers or to house a start up...they do not have the huge leg-up that having access to those things gives you in life. Bezos, Zuckerburg, Warren, Gates....all were upper-middle class at the least...which, in America is worlds away from being lower class....like on an entirely different planet. Pretending they were dirt poor with no help, imo, takes away from the success that they have achieved, albeit with lots of help.
Exactly. And thank you. The people responding that these people may have had help but turned it into billions are missing the point of the story. They weren't born poor, like they like to make it out. And anyone that thinks that having help from wealthy parents isn't what got them there are being obtuse.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
Your name is perfect
Yeah, my parents live in a double wide. My brother is in re-hab, and I make $17/hr. Capitalism ain't doing any favors for me.
I'm with you, Ray.
I just listened to a podcast on Hidden Brain where they talk about how there are many forms of discrimination. We recognize racism and sexism but we rarely notice favouritism. The tell a story about a lady who loves to quilt so her hands are incredibly important to her. Her hands got all cut up by some glass so she went to the hospital. She explained to the doctor how important her hands were to her because of quilting and he was really caring and reassured her that she was getting the best care. A colleague or someone who recognized her realized that she was a Harvard professor. He had her rolled to another floor and call in the best hand specialist to treat her. We rarely get to see what we are missing that the "favourites" get automatically and the "favourites" have no idea what the masses do without automatically. Why was her being a quilter less important than being a harvard professor. It's discrimination.
It's called the halo or horns effect. Unfortunately it's very real. I cannot see President Trump without instantly thinking 'ill informed moron'. Even if he had something amazing to say I wouldn't hear it.
Also, almost anyone with enough family assets to send them to an Ivy League school is pretty much set for life. Why does having the name Harvard, Princeton, Yale, etc, on your degree put you on the shortlist for 6 and 7 figure jobs even with mediocre grades vs someone from an ordinary school or even a community/state college with a 4.0 GPA?
This is all very similar to when Obama said "You didn't build that". It went right over people's heads and they instantly got offended. What he and this gentleman were saying is that hard work is definitely going to get you places, but luck, and a solid helping hand from and outside source is going to vastly improve your chances of being successful. Something along the lines of "It takes a village" but about money and not raising kids.
And without the REST OF US doing our jobs, raising families and paying taxes to provide infrastructure like railroads, airports and highways and libraries; churches and houses of worship; farmers and ranchers that grow the food; oil, gas, solar and utilities that provide the power; financial and banking systems that move the money; health care and educational systems to develop capable workers who are then employed by companies that make all those the products that get sold and bought by the REST OF US... would there even be an Amazon? There is no such thing as “self-made.”
Tell me the story of the thousands that have had assistance and failed. Being given "seed money" is absolutely not a guarantee of generating anything . Generational disbursement of wealth ends poorly, 99.9 % of the time. Look at lottery winners as an example of being given the "Brass Ring" and crapping it away in 5-10 years.
The point isn't "everyone who gets help succeeds." The point is that these billionaires like to pretend they did it WITHOUT the help
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
Did any of them ever claim to be dirt poor though? I can’t recall ever thinking that they were or seeing them portray themselves that way. Even Bezos’s picture of the garage taken at face value very clearly shows that he was not living in poverty. At most they have portrayed themselves as being from middle class backgrounds.
When they tell their stories without the critical pieces, like a $250k loan, they are creating a false narrative. To most people having parents with that much to lend isn't middle class, it's ridiculously wealthy. When the CEO of IBM is a personal friend you tend to have a life full of options. Perhaps they didn't claim to be "dirt poor" but their families were all far wealthier than the average family.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
Most expenses made by the American lower-class are luxury goods. I am not saying all, but statistically this is true. Anyone has the ability to climb if they work hard and open their eyes. The lower class stays poor because of the culture of the lower class. Studies show, if you don't have a child out of wedlock, you finish high school, and you can hold a job, chances are you will be successful. That doesn't mean Bill Gates successful, but better than you would. Look at many lower class families, what do they look like. Again, I am speaking generally.
Placing blame on the "culture" of the lower class is quite disgusting and actually just demonstrates your complete lack of understanding of the challenges faced by the lower class every single day of their lives. You see... poverty is intergenerational. Just like wealth. Finishing school and holding a job can be very real challenges when you don't have the money for the books, the bag or the bus fare. You finish school with average grades. You are pretty proud of your results, given just how fucking hard you worked to get them. You graduate, but you are dressed poorly and don't present well at interviews because you are acutely aware of your poverty. It's hard to put yourself out there. You keep trying and apply for everything. The only offer you get is factory work. The challenges continue from there. You have no car, you are supporting poor ageing parents, it goes on. Poverty by birth is more often than not a life sentence.
The comments fascinate me. "Of course parents lend their kids money to help them out." Uh... your parents have money to lend? OK, you're right there better off than most!
Some parents won't lend any help even if they can. We were extremely lucky that my husbands dad gave us $50,000 to help us buy a home last year. Without that help we wouldn't have a home of our own today
Yep. That WoW guy comment is just soooo... Ugh! I do not know many families that can easily get a quarter million loan on their home to help their kids out. Certainly not my parents. Certainly not anyone's parents that I now... And let's talk about systemic racism here. How many BLACK families own homes that can give a loan like that? Remember that when white families were building their wealth and getting their homes that now cost so much the can be used as equity, black families were refused loans from banks and were simply not allowed to buy property.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
I’m not sure why that’s treated as a mark of shame. I am better off than most and I am very lucky for it. I don’t think that makes me a worse person than someone who happened to be born in less fortunate circumstances. Parents who are able to should help their children have the best opportunities in life. Part of being a good parenting is providing whatever you can to make sure that your children succeed.
Are you trying to pass of whatever success you may have had in your life as solely the product of your own hard work? If not, you're not the subject of this discussion.
Nia, you seem to be missing the point. No one is saying this is "shameful". They are saying that some, esp on the right, try to make it seem as if these individuals are successful not because of their circumstances and their hard work...but simply due to their "hard work". They are the ones who try to shame poorer individuals by holding the likes of Gates, Bezos and Zuckerburg up as "examples" of people who came from very little, but made it due to their determination and hard work. Yes, it was both that helped them achieve success, however the quarter million dollar loans, the high-up corporate connections and plentiful garage space also greatly helped them achieve as well. Parents should absolutely help their kids...the point is that many can not help them as Bezos, Gates and Zuckerburgs parents did...and without that help, their level of success is incredibly difficult. The are not "self made"...they are "self and family and high powered friends made".
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
✅It is very boring for me, talk to me! ✅★★ Write me. ⚡ Maybe we will make friends ⚡⚡ ==>> g︆︆︆︆g.︆︆︆︆gg/kckk5
LeonieAlone lol
LeonieAlone -
No one seems to see the point of this. This is about privilege. People assume if you're poor you don't work hard and if you're rich you must've worked hard and deserved it bc you're so much better than others. Getting help from your parents w large sums of money is not self made. It's not righteous and they're not better than a poor person working a hard job making minimum wage.
The problem is, middle-class Americans think they earned everything themselves, and don't even recognize the help they got from their family as "help." Paying for your daycare & various lessons, paying you to do chores, buying you your own car (or "selling" their car to you for cheap), helping pay for tuition, letting you stay in their house or giving you a no-interest loan when you are short on money, etc. These are all luxuries poor people don't have, but rich people don't think of as luxuries.
I got none of those things growing up and I am comfortably middle class. I swear my ass off everyday for what I have and I'm proud of that.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
I guess it depends on your definition of self made. None of the people started anywhere close to billionaires, and all built businesses that earned billions of dollars. To me that’s what self made means, not that someone never received help from anyone, by which standard nobody would qualify.
Self made is having an idea w 10$ in your pocket and becoming wealthy. It only happens to very very few. If you get a quarter million from your parents that's equal to 1/2 million u are not self made. You are wealthy getting wealthier by connection and family. That's not self made. Not many people can do that anymore if any bc of capitalism and wealth not being distributed like it was in the usas infancy
The point seems to have gone over some of the head of those responding. He is not saying that it is not smart to flip a quarter million into a billion, what he is saying is that people who really are "self made", who really came from "nothing"....do not have parents that can afford to give them hundreds of thousands of dollars!! They do not have parents that own homes with large garages to practice tinkering on computers or to house a start up...they do not have the huge leg-up that having access to those things gives you in life. Bezos, Zuckerburg, Warren, Gates....all were upper-middle class at the least...which, in America is worlds away from being lower class....like on an entirely different planet. Pretending they were dirt poor with no help, imo, takes away from the success that they have achieved, albeit with lots of help.
Exactly. And thank you. The people responding that these people may have had help but turned it into billions are missing the point of the story. They weren't born poor, like they like to make it out. And anyone that thinks that having help from wealthy parents isn't what got them there are being obtuse.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
Your name is perfect
Yeah, my parents live in a double wide. My brother is in re-hab, and I make $17/hr. Capitalism ain't doing any favors for me.
I'm with you, Ray.
I just listened to a podcast on Hidden Brain where they talk about how there are many forms of discrimination. We recognize racism and sexism but we rarely notice favouritism. The tell a story about a lady who loves to quilt so her hands are incredibly important to her. Her hands got all cut up by some glass so she went to the hospital. She explained to the doctor how important her hands were to her because of quilting and he was really caring and reassured her that she was getting the best care. A colleague or someone who recognized her realized that she was a Harvard professor. He had her rolled to another floor and call in the best hand specialist to treat her. We rarely get to see what we are missing that the "favourites" get automatically and the "favourites" have no idea what the masses do without automatically. Why was her being a quilter less important than being a harvard professor. It's discrimination.
It's called the halo or horns effect. Unfortunately it's very real. I cannot see President Trump without instantly thinking 'ill informed moron'. Even if he had something amazing to say I wouldn't hear it.
Also, almost anyone with enough family assets to send them to an Ivy League school is pretty much set for life. Why does having the name Harvard, Princeton, Yale, etc, on your degree put you on the shortlist for 6 and 7 figure jobs even with mediocre grades vs someone from an ordinary school or even a community/state college with a 4.0 GPA?
This is all very similar to when Obama said "You didn't build that". It went right over people's heads and they instantly got offended. What he and this gentleman were saying is that hard work is definitely going to get you places, but luck, and a solid helping hand from and outside source is going to vastly improve your chances of being successful. Something along the lines of "It takes a village" but about money and not raising kids.
And without the REST OF US doing our jobs, raising families and paying taxes to provide infrastructure like railroads, airports and highways and libraries; churches and houses of worship; farmers and ranchers that grow the food; oil, gas, solar and utilities that provide the power; financial and banking systems that move the money; health care and educational systems to develop capable workers who are then employed by companies that make all those the products that get sold and bought by the REST OF US... would there even be an Amazon? There is no such thing as “self-made.”
Tell me the story of the thousands that have had assistance and failed. Being given "seed money" is absolutely not a guarantee of generating anything . Generational disbursement of wealth ends poorly, 99.9 % of the time. Look at lottery winners as an example of being given the "Brass Ring" and crapping it away in 5-10 years.
The point isn't "everyone who gets help succeeds." The point is that these billionaires like to pretend they did it WITHOUT the help
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
Did any of them ever claim to be dirt poor though? I can’t recall ever thinking that they were or seeing them portray themselves that way. Even Bezos’s picture of the garage taken at face value very clearly shows that he was not living in poverty. At most they have portrayed themselves as being from middle class backgrounds.
When they tell their stories without the critical pieces, like a $250k loan, they are creating a false narrative. To most people having parents with that much to lend isn't middle class, it's ridiculously wealthy. When the CEO of IBM is a personal friend you tend to have a life full of options. Perhaps they didn't claim to be "dirt poor" but their families were all far wealthier than the average family.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
Most expenses made by the American lower-class are luxury goods. I am not saying all, but statistically this is true. Anyone has the ability to climb if they work hard and open their eyes. The lower class stays poor because of the culture of the lower class. Studies show, if you don't have a child out of wedlock, you finish high school, and you can hold a job, chances are you will be successful. That doesn't mean Bill Gates successful, but better than you would. Look at many lower class families, what do they look like. Again, I am speaking generally.
Placing blame on the "culture" of the lower class is quite disgusting and actually just demonstrates your complete lack of understanding of the challenges faced by the lower class every single day of their lives. You see... poverty is intergenerational. Just like wealth. Finishing school and holding a job can be very real challenges when you don't have the money for the books, the bag or the bus fare. You finish school with average grades. You are pretty proud of your results, given just how fucking hard you worked to get them. You graduate, but you are dressed poorly and don't present well at interviews because you are acutely aware of your poverty. It's hard to put yourself out there. You keep trying and apply for everything. The only offer you get is factory work. The challenges continue from there. You have no car, you are supporting poor ageing parents, it goes on. Poverty by birth is more often than not a life sentence.
The comments fascinate me. "Of course parents lend their kids money to help them out." Uh... your parents have money to lend? OK, you're right there better off than most!
Some parents won't lend any help even if they can. We were extremely lucky that my husbands dad gave us $50,000 to help us buy a home last year. Without that help we wouldn't have a home of our own today
Yep. That WoW guy comment is just soooo... Ugh! I do not know many families that can easily get a quarter million loan on their home to help their kids out. Certainly not my parents. Certainly not anyone's parents that I now... And let's talk about systemic racism here. How many BLACK families own homes that can give a loan like that? Remember that when white families were building their wealth and getting their homes that now cost so much the can be used as equity, black families were refused loans from banks and were simply not allowed to buy property.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
I’m not sure why that’s treated as a mark of shame. I am better off than most and I am very lucky for it. I don’t think that makes me a worse person than someone who happened to be born in less fortunate circumstances. Parents who are able to should help their children have the best opportunities in life. Part of being a good parenting is providing whatever you can to make sure that your children succeed.
Are you trying to pass of whatever success you may have had in your life as solely the product of your own hard work? If not, you're not the subject of this discussion.
Nia, you seem to be missing the point. No one is saying this is "shameful". They are saying that some, esp on the right, try to make it seem as if these individuals are successful not because of their circumstances and their hard work...but simply due to their "hard work". They are the ones who try to shame poorer individuals by holding the likes of Gates, Bezos and Zuckerburg up as "examples" of people who came from very little, but made it due to their determination and hard work. Yes, it was both that helped them achieve success, however the quarter million dollar loans, the high-up corporate connections and plentiful garage space also greatly helped them achieve as well. Parents should absolutely help their kids...the point is that many can not help them as Bezos, Gates and Zuckerburgs parents did...and without that help, their level of success is incredibly difficult. The are not "self made"...they are "self and family and high powered friends made".
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
✅It is very boring for me, talk to me! ✅★★ Write me. ⚡ Maybe we will make friends ⚡⚡ ==>> g︆︆︆︆g.︆︆︆︆gg/kckk5
LeonieAlone lol
LeonieAlone -
No one seems to see the point of this. This is about privilege. People assume if you're poor you don't work hard and if you're rich you must've worked hard and deserved it bc you're so much better than others. Getting help from your parents w large sums of money is not self made. It's not righteous and they're not better than a poor person working a hard job making minimum wage.
The problem is, middle-class Americans think they earned everything themselves, and don't even recognize the help they got from their family as "help." Paying for your daycare & various lessons, paying you to do chores, buying you your own car (or "selling" their car to you for cheap), helping pay for tuition, letting you stay in their house or giving you a no-interest loan when you are short on money, etc. These are all luxuries poor people don't have, but rich people don't think of as luxuries.
I got none of those things growing up and I am comfortably middle class. I swear my ass off everyday for what I have and I'm proud of that.
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
I guess it depends on your definition of self made. None of the people started anywhere close to billionaires, and all built businesses that earned billions of dollars. To me that’s what self made means, not that someone never received help from anyone, by which standard nobody would qualify.
Self made is having an idea w 10$ in your pocket and becoming wealthy. It only happens to very very few. If you get a quarter million from your parents that's equal to 1/2 million u are not self made. You are wealthy getting wealthier by connection and family. That's not self made. Not many people can do that anymore if any bc of capitalism and wealth not being distributed like it was in the usas infancy