101–110 of 222 posts
This is such nonsense. First of all, there are absolutely people who come from dirt poverty and become wildly successful. Second of all, plenty of people receive lots of help from their parents and amount to precisely nothing. IMO it's fair to refer to your success as "self made" if you exceed the median success level of your class peer group by a substantial margin. If you immigrate from Africa with nothing, and you…
This is such nonsense. First of all, there are absolutely people who come from dirt poverty and become wildly successful. Second of all, plenty of people receive lots of help from their parents and amount to precisely nothing. IMO it's fair to refer to your success as "self made" if you exceed the median success level of your class peer group by a substantial margin. If you immigrate from Africa with nothing, and you…
Do you have an argument against the authors points that does not consist of adhominem and projection? The self-made illusion is precisely that because we ignore the many things that gave us a headstart in life and allowed us to do the things that would've caused other people to fail. The only reason why I'm here now is because I took on a risk of going bankrupt moving across the country for a job opportunity in an in…
Sports are perhaps a good allegory. Sports always have chance & luck. But the best teams have a track record of tilting the odds consistently in their favor, by working to minimize chance and making the most of luck. Does anybody actually say "Well the Patriots/Yankees just got lucky"?
This is such nonsense. First of all, there are absolutely people who come from dirt poverty and become wildly successful. Second of all, plenty of people receive lots of help from their parents and amount to precisely nothing. IMO it's fair to refer to your success as "self made" if you exceed the median success level of your class peer group by a substantial margin. If you immigrate from Africa with nothing, and you…
>IMO it's fair to refer to your success as "self made" if you exceed the median success level of your class peer group by a substantial margin. Even if success were 100% down to luck, there'd still be people who exceeded the median success level of their class peer group by a substantial margin. It's begging the question to simply assert that a majority of these people can fairly claim to be "self made".
It also appears from my experience on this forum that the prevailing opinion here is that this story is not a myth at all, but I understand there is variance here.
The issue with cost of living is an obvious one that is made in comments here, but that still does nothing to address the individuals/families who _still_ struggle in areas that are much cheaper to live. Yes, the insular view of one who has not lived outside SF is troublesome, but it's dishonest to argue as if there is still not real existing poverty in places with a lower cost of living.
While there are many different ways the socioeconomic status of ones family and upbringing can assist in their own success, there are a myriad of ways in which this is also influenced by systemic features to our society, as well as the historical context of that. Think of racially discriminatory housing policies that have helped lead to wealth gaps in the present.
While rags to riches makes a good story, we also don't talk about failures in business as much as we do the successful enterprises. Referring to individual actions in tandem with family assistance, coming to terms with the subject of meritocracy in our society and individual success, I'd propose we're looking at it the wrong way. The part to evaluate is not how much these things have to do with success, but rather how much can they come back from failure? This paints a rather different picture, as those with more financial security are in a much better position to take risks, make poor decisions, while not being pulled into poverty.
Finally, I'd like to point out that there is a growing skepticism of the liberal world order, the mainstream consensus, status quo, whatever you want to call it. More people are realizing now the varying degrees of ways the system is rigged against common working people. With it comes skepticism of the legitimacy of meritocracy in our current social order. This isn't just coming out of a vacuum.
As far as I have noticed, the self-made "myth" is mainly a media trick. For some reason (maybe intrigue, maybe hope, maybe something else), people love rags to riches stories, be it an immigrant to the US with "five dollars in her pocket", a Bill Gates or an Elon Musk. The people who write those stories don't do it to get the word out, they do it to sell you something, so of course they will try to make it as dramatic as possible.
Now there's a counter-movement to balance things out. Bill Gates was actually born in a wealthy family and had a trust fund with millions in it; taking risks with his company was not really a risk. A lot of people like Cara Delevingne (who is constantly advertised everywhere for some reason) are actually part of a family with big ties in their respective industries. They are not truly self-made, but they are not just propelled to the top without significant amounts of work or talent either. The truth is generally somewhere in the middle, with outliers at both ends.
In the end, does it really matter? I feel like social media is full of either stories like this or people pretending to live a perfect life. In short, things that are unattainable for most people even if they were to live a hundred lives. Dreaming big is a wonderful thing, but it definitely won't pan out for the vast majority of people, while making them less happy in the process. That's just my view, maybe wrong in some aspects.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not everyone, if put in Bill Gates' shoes, would have been able to take advantage of such an opportunity. Can you say that if you were there, you'd have done the same? And executed as well afterward, into a multi-billion dollar company?
That's the wrong question. Would Bill Gates have been able to do what he did if he grew up poor, with poor nutrition and poor education? We all owe our success to good fortune and the prosperous society we find ourselves lucky enough to be a part of.
This is such nonsense. First of all, there are absolutely people who come from dirt poverty and become wildly successful. Second of all, plenty of people receive lots of help from their parents and amount to precisely nothing. IMO it's fair to refer to your success as "self made" if you exceed the median success level of your class peer group by a substantial margin. If you immigrate from Africa with nothing, and you…
There are way more people who are born wealthy and continue being wealthy. There are way more people who go from poor to poor. Social mobility is piss poor right now in the US.
If "having a nice family and a wonderful house and a great life" is amounting to nothing, I will take it.
> If you immigrate from Africa with nothing, and you get yourself a law degree and an upper middle class income - that's self made success. If you're born in the US and your entire family is lawyers, maybe that same accomplishment is not "self made success". But if you say, start Microsoft and become a billionaire i'd say that it's fair to call that self-made success.
First of all, Bill Gates had a TON of opportunity and privilege funneled to him from his parents.
Second of all, we are not talking about Bill Gates or Elon Musk. We are talking about the legions of Bradleys going from Georgetown Prep to ivy league schools to finance to the executive class.
You cannot POSSIBLY believe that there is no wealth disparity in the US? That there is not a disparity in opportunity between the wealthy and the middle class/poor?
> I feel like this trope that self-made success is a myth comes almost entirely from people like the author of this article. People who were born with lots of advantages, who still couldn't hack it. They want to justify their own failure to live up to their family's expectations by tearing other people down. Whether or not self-made success is a thing, self-made failure certainly is, and i'd say the author of this article more than qualifies for it.
This is just completely unfounded. You think this entire discussion is propped up by other failed millionaires?
I can't speak to this person's reason for writing the article, but the reason the "self-made success is a myth" is a trope is that people SEE the research, SEE the disparity around them, and smell the bullshit.
This is such nonsense. First of all, there are absolutely people who come from dirt poverty and become wildly successful. Second of all, plenty of people receive lots of help from their parents and amount to precisely nothing. IMO it's fair to refer to your success as "self made" if you exceed the median success level of your class peer group by a substantial margin. If you immigrate from Africa with nothing, and you…
Extra credit: I'm a lowly millionaire, how do I get a seat on a Board of Directors? I have a PhD, 20+ years in the technology field. Am more than qualified for any kind of corporate governance role, etc.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The places with cheaper housing also tend to suffer from a dearth of employment options. There are probably a few mid-sized cities out there that have both cheap housing and decently-paid jobs, but I imagine they are few and far between. I don't know how legitimate this source is, but > ATTOM points out that home prices are climbing faster than wages in 80% of U.S. markets. In fact, median home prices increased at a…
They are pretty common. Kansas City. St. Louis. Des Moines. Dayton. And that's just the Midwest. You don't need a great job market; you just need the one job. Works for some people.
Even better if you show up with a pile of cash from a former career.