You are completely missing the point. None of this is about hard work. They all worked extremely hard for their whole careers, and the ones who are still aliv

You are completely missing the point. None of this is about hard work. They all worked extremely hard for their whole careers, and the ones who are still alive continue to do so. The point is that they all established a tidy fortune by focussing on short term projects before they took on more ambitious projects. That's why most entrepreneurs aren't focused on major world changing projects - they are trying to satisfy their needs for security first, and that is the general rule, not the exception.