That's a fair question. From an early age we're told to study hard in school so that we can one day get a good job. However, there are several reasons for why being an employee doesn't translate into wealth.
First, a job can easily be taken away from you. You could get sick and no longer be able to work. You could get fired. The company might go under. The economy might be slow. Your skills might not be useful in today's age. There are a million ways to lose your job.
Second, you only get paid when you work. One of the tenets of wealth is that you don't need to work in order to get paid. Instead, your assets pay you. The rich earn money day and night, rain or shine. They own companies with employees, and they have real estate and other investments that produce income for them constantly. They don't get paid by somebody else.
Conversely, if employees don't show up for work, they get fired. They're subject to the hours that their bosses set and their salaries are dictated by someone else. Regardless of how much they earn, employees' incomes are limited either by a salary cap or by the amount of hours in a day.
The biggest difference between the rich and employees is that the rich own assets, whereas employees are assets.
Third, employees pay the most in taxes. In general, governments provide tax incentives to entrepreneurs and investors. This is largely because they want to encourage them to create companies and ultimately jobs. As such, the rich are often able to reduce or at least defer a large portion of their tax encumbrance. On the other hand, highly-paid employees often lose about half of their earnings to income tax. They have few deductions or credits that they can use to offset their costs. Losing half of what you make is a major barrier to becoming wealthy.
