I think this article is generally accurate but it doesn't cover all the reasons. My family has been wealthy for over 400 years. The total wealth has kept growin

I think this article is generally accurate but it doesn't cover all the reasons. My family has been wealthy for over 400 years. The total wealth has kept growing but it was reduced at the individual level because people had too many children. I have over 5000 living relatives which I can trace through my family tree. In spite of this, most of my relatives are relatively well off; the main reason for this IMO is that children did not have access to any of their parent's wealth until they died so each generation got to experience what it's like to start with nothing and, at some point, many struggled to make ends meet and worked simple jobs until their retirement. That said, some generations do have it easier than others and they quickly tend to lose touch with reality. When you've had a good childhood, you need to experience a disproportionate amount of struggle in adulthood in order to beat reality into your skull. My wife was born in USSR (had a tough life) and she used to make fun of how naive I was whenever I complained about how crooked and messed up things are when you don't have money. She could not believe that I did not see it before. She thought all people from wealthy backgrounds were aware of all the evil that they cause behind the scenes. It turns out that the human mind is really good at forming blind spots when it's convenient.