My wife and I come from very different backgrounds, but are now at roughly the same place in life in terms of income despite our different career paths. She is an RN and makes 120k base salary (usually ends up making 150k with overtime and bonus), I am an Operations Manager and make 165k (usually around 200k with bonus stock options). I grew up upper-middle class, with my father as a Sales Director and my mother a teacher. On the other hand, her parents were boat people from Vietnam who escaped after the war with very little money, education, or English-speaking skills. She and her two siblings grew up in low-income housing, with her father working at a factory and her mother working two jobs at clothing stores. Her parents instilled the importance of education to her and her siblings, and taught them that you have to make the best of whatever circumstances you are in rather than complain about what's out of your control.

Growing up, my wife focused hard on her studies, and was able to go to community college for very little cost while working a few part-time jobs. After finishing community college, she then went to nursing school on a merit scholarship and another scholarship for disadvantaged first generation college students, both of which paid for nearly all of the tuition. My wife tells me all the time that she never thinks of herself as a victim or "oppressed" by society, and that she doesn't understand the mentality behind people who grew up in similar circumstances to her who always complain about being victims.

Now, to be clear, I understand that there are some people in truly dreadful circumstances who were worse off than my wife. Even though my wife's family was very poor, she is fortunate that they were supportive of her and her siblings and were not addicted to drugs or alcohol or abusive. I also understand that there are plenty of people in the world who grow up in abject poverty and have to deal with war, famine, and disease that we don't experience. However, I'm speaking primarily about the people who live in a wealthy, expansive country like America and complain constantly about being poor and never able to advance in their lives.

I believe that almost every single person in America with access to internet can lift themselves out of poverty if they choose to do so. Sure, you might not become extremely wealthy, but I believe that a decent standard of living is very attainable for anyone who works for it. There are countless paths to a middle class life in America if you grew up disadvantaged: join the military, go to community college, even working at a a retail or food service job has the potential to turn into a management job and a comfortable life. My friend who dropped out of high school ended up becoming a manager at a construction company, working his way up from a laborer. He's not a super-genius, he just worked hard and had the ambition to rise up. Yes, you'll have to put in more work than someone who has connections and can walk into a high-paying job with no effort. However, just like my wife frequently says, you have to make the best of your circumstances and not complain about things out of your control. As I outlined earlier, there are so many options and services available for people in disadvantaged circumstances to rise up out of them, just as my wife did.

In fact, my cousin grew up extremely privileged, but managed to end up very poor because of his own choices. His parents are extremely wealthy and paid for him to go to private schools, one-on-one tutoring, and an Ivy League education. Despite all of these advantages, he ended up partying and wasting most of his time in school. Once he dropped out, he continued to spiral. His father tried to help him find work and got him a job at a friend's company that his family worked closely with, but he was fired for sleeping on the job and doing drugs in the company bathroom. Only recently is he starting to pick his life back up again.

My wife has given me a lot of perspective on how it's absolutely possible for someone who grew up very poor to become wealthy with the right mindset and ambition, and I want to know what others think too.