Your place in life is the intersection of circumstance and merit.
Imagine 4 integers
(MeritWeight * Merit) * (CircumstancesWeight Circumstances)
We can disagree what respective weights ought to be assigned but its pretty clear that it circumstances favor you sufficiently your trajectory is high regardless of merit. If your Merit is high enough your trajectory may be high regardless of merit.
I don't think anyone disagrees much even though passionate arguments are passed by all.
The thing is that only a minority are gifted by circumstances and most people are neither worthless nor extremely worthy. The merely average are bound for average lives at best in most cases and often for lesser lives depending on how other circumstances of their lives play out.
When people say that life is unfair, which it is, and you say but look here is a list of a minority of worthy who made good despite middling or worse circumstances as if this itself were a refutation you are aren't even addressing the same argument, let alone refuting it.
For the record. The average small business owners salary is 66-73k in the US. By contrast the median individual income is 40k. A middle class individual whose father owned a "hole in the wall" had a family that probably had more to start with than 70% of their fellows. This example is itself a demonstration of your lack of perspective.
You literally think someone who started off better than average started out with substantial disadvantages.