A privilege is a special right reserved for certain people. Making good choices isn't reserved for those who are middle class and above.
No doubt the path to career success is easier for those with parents who made an a collection of smart decisions, as well having made past smart choices.
If I must accept this definition of 'privilege', then we can simply call all outcomes in our life to be a direct result of the amount of 'privilege' we have.
Personally I reject this broad definition of privilege as it strips away peoples need to accept the fact that at the end of the day, they have the ability to make their own choices and develop their own self discipline.
There are world class developers who have arisen from 3rd world country level educations, there are elite athletes in third world countries who have self-coached their way to olympic level performance. Class mobility exists, and stripping away personal responsibility via the process of redefining language does not help anyone except for those who wish to just continue their life without critical introspection.
At the core, this is a political argument hidden under the shroud of being a linguistics argument.
> If I must accept this definition of 'privilege', then we can simply call all outcomes in our life to be a direct result of the amount of 'privilege' we have.
You can accept this definition without reducing your entire life to a preordained path. There’s middle ground where you can accept that some portion of your life was your choice, but the rest of it was due to circumstances you were raised in or had no choice in. Nobody is suggesting you didn’t work hard to get where you are, but it’d also be crazy to pretend that the white child born to rich engineers has the same path as a poor person of color who had to help work at a young age to support their single mother and siblings.
Being a software developer isn't a privilege, it's a choice.