There’s no better story than the poor kid who works his ass off up from the gutter to completely and utterly destroy the rich kids who bullied and taunted them when they were growing up. But unfortunately it turns out that this might just be a story as the stats show that this isn’t really that likely to happen in real life.

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A recently published study by Richard Reeves and Isabel Sawhill makes for a pretty sobering read. You can see the results from it in the below chart, published by the Federal Reserve Bank Of Boston at their annual conference:

For those of you who aren’t so good at charts, I’ll put it into words for you (hope you’re good at words) – it’s basically showing that rich high school dropouts (remember that’s people that don’t even finish high school FFS) end up doing about as well in life in terms of their income as poor people that manage to graduate college. That’s a hell of an incentive to go to college and get that degree eh?

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Why is this happening? Well, there are a couple of reasons on both sides of the equation. Typically rich kids don’t need a high school diploma to get ahead as their rich parents can put them to work in the family business or just let them live off their inheritance, whereas even if poor kids do manage to get a college diploma, they’re usually in so much debt as a result of it that even if they do manage to get a high paying job (again not guaranteed), it doesn’t exactly leave them in the best position financially. They’re also more likely to live in disadvantaged neighbourhoods (especially in the case of black people) that leave them disconnected from opportunity, although I’m not sure why that is.

So the story I opened this article with doesn’t actually happen that much in reality. Still, it’s a good story and one to aspire to so maybe you could be the one to buck the trend. Good luck.

For more sickening photos of rich kids, check out the new billionaires on the street – the rich kids of Nigeria.