When you become wealthy you can claim it as merit or luck. If you become too wealthy you become separate and must attribute it to something: the meritorious lean into hard-nosed grit, while the lucky become progressive altruists.

However, neither will give up wealth to re-test their political ideology.

The lucky realize the odds and mouth platitudes to alleviate guilt, while the meritorious secretly realize their luck but have tied their identity to competence.