My assumption is that your comment about things that happened a century ago is referring to slavery. This is something that has impacted numerous generations of

My assumption is that your comment about things that happened a century ago is referring to slavery. This is something that has impacted numerous generations of people and the racist ideology that sprung from that period has put into place numerous legislative systems to prevent people in poverty from gaining ground. We exist as part of a system, so yes it absolutely is relevant. Mobility is at an all time low, so examples of "but I made it" are irrelevant