[peletiah]

Owning a 25,000-acre farm is a modest background and his rise therefore evidence that the American system still works? Rather sounds like he was born into a sufficiently privileged environment and all the benefits that come with it (Mainly an educated background and discipline to work hard). A Jeff Bezos from a "lesser" background might have strayed from this path earlier due to the circumstances of his upbringing.

Of course the status quo is hardly comparable with a feudalist system, but the stark inequality you are born into is very much - and even more so the difference in wealth and power between "regular people" and the super-rich.