‘Becoming Rich Is More About Nurture Than Nature’ – New Study Claims

If your parents are rich, then you’re more likely to be wealthy. However, scientists have long debated whether this is down to genetics or the culture in which children are raised.

Now, a new study claims to have finally settled the debate; nurture, it says, is far more important that nature when it comes to amassing wealth.

‘Innate biology is only a small factor in wealth,’ Kaveh Majlesi, a professor of economics at Lund University in Sweden and co-author of the study told fivethirtyeight.com.

Previous studies have attempting to find a ‘rich gene’ which might explain how genetic characteristics that cause people to be wealthy are passed down.

The latest research, however, found that the wealth of an adopted child – before receiving an inheritance – is similar to that of their adoptive parents, rather than their biological ones.

Majlesi, however, told fivethirtyeight.com that the trend may be even more powerful in countries where there is greater economic inequality.

‘Our findings suggest that wealth transmission is not because children from wealthier families are inherently more talented…wealth begets wealth,’ the researchers write.

Source: DailyMail