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It’s upsetting to know that your jet-set friends will always have it better than you thanks to their wealthy families, but it’s a reality we have to accept. Many have made their fortunes through hard work, getting up at 5 and investing all their energy in changing paradigms. Who can argue, then, that their offspring received the best?

According to recent studies, it is this simple recipe that usually makes an entrepreneur: wealthy family (i.e. safety net) → great education → Mom & Dad supply capital after graduation → Mom & Dad’s connections pave the way to business-oriented future → business works thanks to positive attitude and risk taking.

Quartz recently interviewed a number of experts who studied entrepreneurs and the most common traits they share, and reported that they key advantage is to have your basic needs covered – not a particular set of genes, as some reports state – so you can afford to be creative. It also helps to be white, educated, and male. Interviewed on the subject, a 31-year-old female entrepreneur (who asked to remain anonymous) said: “This whole bulk of the population is being seduced into thinking that they can just go out and pursue their dream anytime, but it’s not true.”

Ouch!

Exceptions to the rule

“Generally” doesn’t equal “always.” Probably the best example of entrepreneur starting from the bottom is Apple’s late CEO and co-founder, Steven P. Jobs. Not only was he orphaned, but his adoptive working-class parents couldn’t even stop him from dropping out of college. He fell in love with the idea of personal computers thanks to his good friend Steve Wozniak, together they helped ignite the personal computer revolution and, decades later, people worship him (even though it was Woz who did all the legwork the early days).

Jay-Z is another example of beating the odds. Black, abandoned by his father, lived in the projects as a thug (a real, gun-wielding thug), grandma buys him a boombox one day and everything changes: Jay-Z gets inspired to write lyrics and freestyle, sells CDs out of his car, makes it big → net worth half a billion dollars today.

One more example to re-inflate the bubble that Quartz burst for us all, Michael Dell: dude starts as a dishwasher in a Chinese restaurant for $2.30 an hour, raises $18,000 from Houston Post sales, buys a car and three computers, starts PCs Limited in his dorm room, drops out of college, focuses entirely on selling computers, makes 6$ million in the first year of sales (1984), becomes a billionaire by the year 2000. What Dell admittedly had going for him was good education. But education is a bit more accessible than than actual cash money. A bigger list of entrepreneurs risen from poverty can be found here.

So, no. It’s certainly not a requirement to be lock-stock. But it does help (a lot). And let’s not forget luck either 😉