Not one of them through inheritance. Sure, you have the waltons a little lower on the list.
As a person who started in the bottom decile of wealth I want to hate inheritance at least as much as the next person. But at first glance it sure doesn't look good for these "researchers".
The "researchers" were the Union Bank of Switzerland. "UBS manages the largest amount of private wealth in the world, counting approximately half of the world's billionaires among its clients." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UBS
According to Forbes there are 2,6k+ billionaires, so the top 10 is 0.3% of that.
Arnault: "In 1971, he graduated from the École Polytechnique, France's leading engineering school, and began work for his father's company. Three years later, after he convinced his father to shift the focus of the company to real estate"
Gates: "His father was a prominent lawyer" "At age 13, he enrolled in the private Lakeside prep school, where he wrote his first software program" "Microsoft co-founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen first met as teenagers in the late 1960s at Lakeside School in Seattle"
Zuckerberg: "My dad, funny enough, right before each of us went to college offered us the options of going to college or like investing in a franchise and running it,” sister Randi Zuckerberg told CNN Business’ Laurie Segall of her dad’s offer to his son and each of his three daughters.
They may not have literally handed their kids a sack full of money, but you can't argue that people like Arnault, Gates, Zuckerberg are not largely where they are today due to their parents wealth.
> Annual tuition $40,080
Does your parents spending $160,000 to send you to high school not count as inheriting wealth ?
Gates grandfather was president of a bank. Gates left his prep school for Harvard with a million dollar trust fund. His mother was on a board with the chairman of IBM which helped launch Microsoft into the big time.
Buffett's father was a congressman. His grandparents owned a chain of grocery stores.
Zuckerberg's high school was Phillips Exeter Academy. Currently tuition is over $50,000 a year - for high school.
They all had rich parents that provided a massive safety net in case their ventures failed.
For over 90% of the country, if they quit their day jobs to try out some business venture, they'd be bankrupt within a few months just from living expenses, let alone business expenses. Half the country would probably be out on the street within weeks as they wouldn't be able to pay the rent.
57% of Americans can't afford a $1,000 emergency expense [0]. For these people, even if they didn't quit their day jobs, they'd have an extremely difficult time getting a business off the ground.
[0] https://fortune.com/recommends/banking/57-percent-of-america...
The "researchers" were the Union Bank of Switzerland. "UBS manages the largest amount of private wealth in the world, counting approximately half of the world's billionaires among its clients." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UBS