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Survivorship Bias

xkcd.com

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Re: Survivorship Bias

#211

Post by Noseshine »

Nomentatus wrote: post #180
Noseshine wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the trouble with you guys: You propose ideas that work - but only as long as only very few people do it. Thank you for demonstrating it so clearly - by the way, did you yourself even notice this catch? It may work for anyone , but not for everyone . I love that in English those words sound so similar. I might be tempted to consider that's part of the problem (as part of the larger "how does language influence…

It's a template, lots of businesses fit it pretty well. He isn't inviting competition to his corner of the garden, you'll have to find your own. This won't work for self-indulgent humans, very true - so it won't work for everyone.

I refer to what I already wrote. Nothing you say addresses my point. It only works for some.

> lots of businesses fit it pretty well.

Keyword: "businesses". If everybody follows that path, who is going to work at those businesses?

You completely failed to grasp my point. You keep looking at a niche and miss the big picture: I only works for a few!

Not to mention what it would mean if everybody could become a millionaire, never even mind how.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#212

Post by yhavr »

What this bias really tells us that knowledge about failures and how to prevent them is even more important that steps to success. Yes, the world is completely random, and suppose it's like dice throwing. So to maximise your profit, you need to stick to two simple rules: - Make sure that next throw doesn't wipe your out of the game. - Maximize number of attempts per unit of time.

The belief that success is completely luck-based is useless, unless there's a uniform distribution of 'success' over all types of people and their strategies. That is, even if I leave my job now without any verified product, I have the same chances to establish a profitable business, then a guy who already has paying customers.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#213

Post by ux-app »

taneq wrote: post #210
gk1 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may like reading The Millionaire Next Door. It explains that the majority of millionaires in the US are like those you describe, and not like the flashy movie ones we see in the media. Edit: Link for convenience: https://www.amazon.com/Millionaire-Next-Door-Surprising-Amer...

The bar for 'millionaire' is significantly lower than it once was. Inflation, combined (in some markets) with huge raises in property values, basically means that anyone who's paid their house off is likely to qualify. A total net worth (including real estate etc.) of more than a million dollars doesn't imply that someone's particularly wealthy the way it once did.

The home you live in is usually not included when classifying high net worth individuals. A common definition at least here in Australia is:

"a HNWI defined as having more than US$1 million in investable assets, excluding their primary residence, collectibles and consumables"

Re: Survivorship Bias

#214

Post by ux-app »

taneq wrote: post #189
ux-app wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'll show you ten people who who attempted a safe boring white collar job, tried to run a local service business, or planned to save aggressively over decade, but did not achieve $1mm net worth For the purpose of this discussion that's irrelevant. As you yourself stated > [Survivorship bias is] about falsely attributing a causal relationship between the people's actions and their success Given that within a 50km ra…

> For the purpose of this discussion that's irrelevant. Actually, no, that's precisely the discussion we're having. > In Australia where I'm from there are approx 234,000 high net worth individuals (HNWI) (defined as having more than US$1 million ($1.35 million) in investable assets, excluding their primary residence, collectibles and consumables). Which is where, precisely? > We have 8 capital cities. Using a simple…

I live is Australia. I used an even distribution for simplicity's sake. Obviously the wealth is skewed toward Melb/Syd.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#215

Post by crusso »

aristus wrote: post #119
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…

You'd be surprised. There are several pressures that keep doctor supply low in the US, not least the medical boards staffed by doctors who ahem have obvious moral hazard to constrain supply and maintain their 400k/year income. A close friend of mine is now a cardiologist. As far as I can tell his residency was a three-year hazing ritual / sleep-dep experiment. To top it off, when he was finally done and out in San Fr…

I don't disagree that the AMA's stranglehold on MD distribution is a problem.

But I have several members of my family who are/were doctors. Residency is hard, pure and simple. It's hard for everyone and takes tremendous perseverance. But perseverance is the opposite of luck.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#216

Post by maxerickson »

crusso wrote: post #215
aristus wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd be surprised. There are several pressures that keep doctor supply low in the US, not least the medical boards staffed by doctors who ahem have obvious moral hazard to constrain supply and maintain their 400k/year income. A close friend of mine is now a cardiologist. As far as I can tell his residency was a three-year hazing ritual / sleep-dep experiment. To top it off, when he was finally done and out in San Fr…

I don't disagree that the AMA's stranglehold on MD distribution is a problem. But I have several members of my family who are/were doctors. Residency is hard, pure and simple. It's hard for everyone and takes tremendous perseverance. But perseverance is the opposite of luck.

So how much of it is beneficial or even necessary?

(obviously the training and education received is both of those things; I'm talking about the method)

Re: Survivorship Bias

#217

Post by _wwz4 »

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…

The 40 hour business success is the rarity and often it's predicated upon other previous sacrifices made so that 40 hours is later sufficient.

As with the xkcd comic, it seems silly to base your success model on the lottery type system that is the rarity rather than on what works most generally.

Besides, it's not always about the amount of time being worked.

Merit is a combination of hours put in, intelligence, the value of decisions made, etc.

I'm not arguing for strictly the number of hours worked. I'm arguing for merit based upon a number of factors vs the idea that all success is determined by luck.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#218

Post by crusso »

pacaro wrote: post #130
falcolas wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

The NTS fallacy is based upon goalpost moving with no clear metric for success. Graduating medical school is definably not goalpost moving.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#219

Post by crusso »

reallydontask wrote: post #163
crusso wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It varies. My uncle had a band and toured the small venue scene in South Louisiana back in the day. My mom was a chorus singer in the New Orleans opera company. Both made varying levels of careers out of their talents and hard work. Both were popular at parties.

isn't this a case of survivorship bias? after all, just because it worked for you uncle and mother doesn't really mean that it works for anybody else.

I'm perfectly willing to accept some scientific data on the subject in lieu of my anecdotal data if you have any.

In the absence of a lot of data, I make due with what I have and in general find the notion credible that working on being a successful musician has other benefits even if you don't achieve Taylor Swift levels of success.

Re: Survivorship Bias

#220

Post by pacaro »

crusso wrote: post #218
pacaro wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

The NTS fallacy is based upon goalpost moving with no clear metric for success. Graduating medical school is definably not goalpost moving.

My observation was that introducing the "didn't work hard enough" element _is_ moving the goalposts.
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