[bsanr2]

>among people in his position

That is, among college students without the baggage of full adulthood (debt, personal responsibilities, the mental and physical degradation that starts as early as your mid-twenties, and the risk aversion that comes with these things), and with the support of at least moderately wealthy parents and the affordances they bring: yes, there's not much here to show above-average performance. This individual received exceptional advantages which he certainly capitalized on, but there's no indication that he did so above the level of an average replacement.

We owe it to ourselves to be realistic about prospects.

[cloverich]

There's literally millions of college students in that position every year. Its absolutely not common for most of them to start _a_ successful business, let a lone several. I've worked at companies who had far more money, more connections, and more advantages, that ended up with less. OP's an outlier irrespective of their advantages.

> the mental and physical degradation that starts as early as your mid-twenties

Degrading in your twenties (in any meaningful sense) is _highly_ atypical.

[bsanr2]

Out of the ~20 million college students, the number that come from families with $40k in liquid assets is probably not plural-millions-with-an-s, and is probably considerably less than a million. With the field of competition winnowed thusly, and again considering the myriad unearned advantages such a background generally entails, this person's success is probably far more common than you're wagering. All you're proving is that people in his class are far less deserving than we'd thought.

>Degrading in your twenties (in any meaningful sense) is _highly_ atypical.

Nah. One's twenties are a common period for mental illness to develop, as well as the period when heretofore silent congenital defects become apparent. It is also generally the first time when injuries become much less likely to fully heal, and when they may become lifelong encumberances.

Someone who hasn't experienced some form of degradation by 30 - worsening eyesight, a sports injury, onset of depression, even balding - is someone who is privileged indeed.