Not everyone can simply work their way out of things . Despite losing economic privilege , what other privileges did you have working in your favor in that time ? Are you perhaps white , or white passing ? Are you male ? Are you hetero , or presumed hetero ? Are you cisgender ? What is your Nation of origin ? Are you an immigrant ? Do you have any intellectual disabilities ? Physical disabilities ? All of these things are invisible factors that can tilt the scales for or against people . It is considerably easier for an ablebodied cis white man to pull himself out of the gutter than it is for most others because of the social pressures that work in their favor . Please stop me here if I ' ve lost you though . If you ' re still with me , great ! Under capitalism , these advantages snowball for folks over time . Microaggressions add up , big and little things happen . Folks are left with trauma and marginalization that others never had to deal with . You have folks who made it through what looked the same to them , looking back at others thinking , Wtf , I made it through all this , you must be lazy or bad or something . But they don ' t see all the other things that have effected their lives . I ' m just trying to say that although this worked for you personally , this might not be a viable path for others due to systemic marginalization making it unviable . We all work , however your work is more likely to pay off . Do you get me ?