Umbrage

To the extent we take offense with people who strive to make a lot of money, say, an oil executive, or financial consultant of some sort, I ask why we don't take a offense with people who strive to have a very high status, one that doesn't always correlate well with copious quantities of cash, like a professor.   Who critics professors in this sense?  Only the lunatics on the far right, and only because of the professors' perspective on issues they disagree with. 

It seems odd to me that people might hold a high opinion of one and not the other.  What's the distinction?

Add: Which is to say that we don't take issue with naked ambition, necessarily, as long as it is couched in the right terms; we take issue, instead, with people who are more successful than we are financially because we perceive them as immorally benefiting from our unwillingness to enter certain fields.  Which is to say we find ourselves exceptional and make others less so because of their perceived moral faults.