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Survivorship Bias

xkcd.com

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Re: Survivorship Bias

#121

Post by frgtpsswrdlame »

ux-app wrote: post #23

Most people are missing the point a bit here. Survivorship bias doesn't relate to people who worked hard, improved themselves and now earn 1-10MM/yr. There are loads of stories like that. Survivorship bias is "Zuck did X, Y and Z, if I do the same then I'll be a multi-billionaire too!" Following the playbook of those that made it into the top 0.001% is foolish and does not properly account for the large part luck pla…

Actually, I think you are missing the point.

>Survivorship bias doesn't relate to people who worked hard, improved themselves and now earn 1-10MM/yr.

It absolutely does! Luck and upbringing (which I really consider a subset of luck) are such huge factors in how much money you will make in your life.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#122

Post by sudoyou1 »

leipert wrote: post #48
kebman wrote: post #25

Survivorship? Is that the ship that survives? I just call it survivor bias. But then, that's just me. :D

> word-forming element meaning "quality, condition; act, power, skill; office, position; relation between, [...] from Old English -sciepe" [1] It seems like -ship is related to the German -schaft. e.g. Gemeinschaft fellowship, Gesellschaft companionship, Freundschaft friendship ... Thanks for letting me search for it. Now I learned something on a slow friday. [1] http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=-ship

You are correct. It also gets more similar in Dutch: "-schap"

Gemeinschaft -> gemeenschap Freundschaft -> vriendschap Gesellschaft -> gezelschap

But in the case of "survivorship", the German equivalent doesn't include "-schaft". It sounds awkward. Probably in Dutch as well.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#123

Post by leejo »

amsilprotag wrote: post #107
leejo wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I saw the comic in my feeds this morning I immediately thought of Darius Kazemi's XOXO talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_F9jxsfGCw

I was reminded of that talk when I saw the comic, and surprised to see the comments debating the influence of luck and effort in life outcomes. Both media are making the same joke, but I don't think anyone would feel a need to defend effort if they had seen the talk instead of the comic. The talk's beat-for-beat parody of the just-so success story paints a very clear and recognizable target.

Indeed, Darius makes this clear when he moves onto the more serious second half of his talk: "... beyond a certain threshold of work that you put into your projects, success is entirely out of your hands". You can substitute "projects" and "success" for whatever you feel applies for your situation.

If anyone doesn't want to watch the entire video then just watch the last 39 seconds, it ties in nicely with the comic as Darius argues that talking about "how to buy more lottery tickets" is useful whereas "how to win the lottery" is not.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#124

Post by falcolas »

crusso wrote: post #75
pg314 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's no survivorship bias in going to med school, becoming a specialist and then earning 400k/yr. There is, just not as pronounced as in the lottery example. You ignore all the students who failed or dropped out of med school, didn't make the cut to become a specialist, or had to take a job that didn't make 400k/yr.

But if some make it to med school but then don't succeed, how many of those failure cases ended up not working hard enough? Once you have a class of medical students, it's not a lottery system on who succeeds. Short of those who, through no fault of their own, run out of money or have some unfortunate circumstance that takes them out of the program - the ones who succeed seem very likely to have made it on merit of s…

And there it is: They failed because they "didn't work hard enough." It's really easy to classify failures as not working hard enough, and successful people as having worked hard enough.

But what's hard enough? Can we quantify by any means other than the outcome?

We can point to people who have never worked on their business for more than 40 hours a week and their business has succeeded. We can point to people who have put more than 120 hours a week into their business who have failed. Who really worked harder?

Re: Survivorship Bias

#125

Post by optimuspaul »

ux-app wrote: post #23

Most people are missing the point a bit here. Survivorship bias doesn't relate to people who worked hard, improved themselves and now earn 1-10MM/yr. There are loads of stories like that. Survivorship bias is "Zuck did X, Y and Z, if I do the same then I'll be a multi-billionaire too!" Following the playbook of those that made it into the top 0.001% is foolish and does not properly account for the large part luck pla…

I think you are wrong about that. Hard work does not guarantee success. Survivorship bias applies to everything that has a high possibility of failure, which definitely includes med school.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#126

Post by angstrom »

ux-app wrote: post #23

Most people are missing the point a bit here. Survivorship bias doesn't relate to people who worked hard, improved themselves and now earn 1-10MM/yr. There are loads of stories like that. Survivorship bias is "Zuck did X, Y and Z, if I do the same then I'll be a multi-billionaire too!" Following the playbook of those that made it into the top 0.001% is foolish and does not properly account for the large part luck pla…

Thought that was cargo cult. Going through the steps of what was successful in a given situation without understanding the logic behind those steps at the time they were applied or perhaps the reason they worked in the first place assuming luck was not a factor.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#127

Post by ctdonath »

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #114
ux-app wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Not compared with the loads of stories of people who worked hard, improved themselves, and still don't earn anywhere near $1M/yr The vast majority of single digit millionaires are doctors, lawyers, construction company owners. I've even personally met a factory worker who retired with > $1mm in savings due to prudent money management (no lottery wins, just basic financial management for 30+ years). I live in a compl…

>He's super smart, hard working and I'm sure that accounts for the majority of his success. Why are you sure? Social mobility in america is depressingly low right now. Our meritocracy is a meritocracy no more, if it ever was one.

The mobility is there for the taking, though disincentives are at an all-time high.

Welfare benefits are structured (presumably unintentionally) to discourage working: earning about $12/hr plus welfare equals about $36/hr without welfare ... but in between, welfare benefits plummet so fast that trying to work your way up from $12/hr to $36/hr amounts to a huge pay cut. As such many can't or won't make the bridging effort.

The proliferation of debt is the other major problem. With social norms & pressures to buy more house & goods than one can actually afford, one becomes self-trapped in preserving an existing paycheck and fulfilling debt maintenance rather than really saving money and taking risks that may temporarily disrupt income.

The smart & hard working ones realize up front that climbing a mountain may involve traversing a valley first, and that poor-looking social presence is necessary to accumulate wealth (to be flaunted later). The rest get stalled trying to make credit card interest payments.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#128

Post by speby »

taneq wrote: post #69
ux-app wrote: post #23

Most people are missing the point a bit here. Survivorship bias doesn't relate to people who worked hard, improved themselves and now earn 1-10MM/yr. There are loads of stories like that. Survivorship bias is "Zuck did X, Y and Z, if I do the same then I'll be a multi-billionaire too!" Following the playbook of those that made it into the top 0.001% is foolish and does not properly account for the large part luck pla…

> There are loads of stories like that. Not compared with the loads of stories of people who worked hard, improved themselves, and still don't earn anywhere near $1M/yr. Otherwise thinking that those successes have some meaningful advice to offer wouldn't be survivorship bias, it'd actually be correct. > Following the playbook of those that made it into the top 0.001% is foolish and does not properly account for the…

Of course someone has to actually become a pop star so if you never even approach or try it, then you almost certainly will have zero chance.

And in a different decade, who knows, Taylor Swift herself may have never been anything particularly famous or well-known.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#129

Post by pimlottc »

ux-app wrote: post #23

Most people are missing the point a bit here. Survivorship bias doesn't relate to people who worked hard, improved themselves and now earn 1-10MM/yr. There are loads of stories like that. Survivorship bias is "Zuck did X, Y and Z, if I do the same then I'll be a multi-billionaire too!" Following the playbook of those that made it into the top 0.001% is foolish and does not properly account for the large part luck pla…

Er, of course survivorship bias applies - it applies to everything.

Not everyone who goes to med school ends up as a high earner, not even all those who graduate. Sure, their success rate is much higher than those who decided to play the lottery instead, but there's always going to be some degree of survivorship bias when the failures are less visible than the successes.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#130

Post by pacaro »

falcolas wrote: post #124
crusso wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But if some make it to med school but then don't succeed, how many of those failure cases ended up not working hard enough? Once you have a class of medical students, it's not a lottery system on who succeeds. Short of those who, through no fault of their own, run out of money or have some unfortunate circumstance that takes them out of the program - the ones who succeed seem very likely to have made it on merit of s…

And there it is: They failed because they "didn't work hard enough." It's really easy to classify failures as not working hard enough, and successful people as having worked hard enough. But what's hard enough? Can we quantify by any means other than the outcome? We can point to people who have never worked on their business for more than 40 hours a week and their business has succeeded. We can point to people who ha…

At which point this turns into a "No true Scotsman" fallacy
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