The "actual unpleasant work" is to a significant extent the domain of entrepreneurs.
For example, cleaning companies - often started by one person doing the cleaning - are an absolutely textbook example of entrepreneurship.
Some of those entrepreneurs then become millionaires :)
(Updating this post: obviously a lot of unpleasant work is done by non-entrepreneurs. But the maxim of "find something necessary but unpleasant and start a company doing it as a high-success-chance play" is also very true: entrepreneurs don't, as a class, all avoid the nasty stuff.
In the UK, the phrase I'm looking for is "where there's muck, there's brass.")
Along those lines, the idea of meeting a millionaire who makes bottle caps tickles me more than meeting most well known entrepreneurs like Phil Knight. Something about commonplace, yet invisible products.
For example, cleaning companies - often started by one person doing the cleaning - are an absolutely textbook example of entrepreneurship.
Some of those entrepreneurs then become millionaires :)
(Updating this post: obviously a lot of unpleasant work is done by non-entrepreneurs. But the maxim of "find something necessary but unpleasant and start a company doing it as a high-success-chance play" is also very true: entrepreneurs don't, as a class, all avoid the nasty stuff.
In the UK, the phrase I'm looking for is "where there's muck, there's brass.")