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Comment by lysace | Hacker News Reader

The inverse of elite isn’t working class background.

It approximately is, imho. Wealth follows a power law distribution. People put the dividing line at different points, but it doesn't matter so much. The elite are a tiny fraction. The middle class are also a relatively small faction of the population and for the most part, the middle class tend to be lumped in with the elite, because they tend to be in complementary political factions.

Now I know that in the US, people group everyone with a job in the middle class, but that's just semantics.

The middle class in western Europe and the USA does run into the millions according to most definitions.

However, class is also about your origins not just your wallet and YV is in no way a horny-handed son of toil.

What they mean is that there are plenty of people with organizational skills that come from a working class background, and essentially all of the smartest people in science come from working class, even immigrant backgrounds. Why? Simple: it takes a lot of long, concerted effort, with few results, and people are not very likely to do that if they have it too easy in childhood.

It's birth, not brains or organizational skills that make "leaders" in Europe. Hell, the highest European politician gets criticized for exactly that a great many times. Very lucky to be born where she was born, not much at all in terms of accomplishments, and zero spectacular achievements.

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