Not “everyone”. Imagine the economy like a tank of water, and each person a single molecule of H20, and proximity to the top of the tank represents relative wea

Not “everyone”. Imagine the economy like a tank of water, and each person a single molecule of H20, and proximity to the top of the tank represents relative wealth. So all the water molecules are constantly shifting a bit, but mostly stay in place unless something shakes up the tank. If you sprinkle water on the top, those molecules stay mostly at the top: rich parents’ kids mostly stay rich. If you feed water in through a pump at the bottom, most of those molecules will stay at the bottom: poor parents’ kids usually stay poor. In general, the closer you are to the top or bottom, the more likely you are to stay there. Adding from the bottom pushes the people at the top even higher, yes; but those in between the bottom and top mostly just shift around as the middle gets wider.