141–150 of 275 posts
"I believe my generation will overthrow the arbitrary and brutal authority of corporate capitalism and bigoted conservatism in favor of rationalistic, libertarian socialism driven by a scientific approach and a concern for universal social justice." That's what my generation believed. And my parents' generation. And their parents....read some literature from 100 years ago, for example by the Fabians or other socialis…
"The difference is that children of wealth traverse it at a height of one meter over a mattress, while the middle-class and poor traverse it at a height of 20 meters over a lava pit." I notice no one is commenting on this part. Namely, that for children of financial privilege, the risk/reward ratio for a career is markedly skewed compared to their middle class peers.
"The difference is that children of wealth traverse it at a height of one meter over a mattress, while the middle-class and poor traverse it at a height of 20 meters over a lava pit." I notice no one is commenting on this part. Namely, that for children of financial privilege, the risk/reward ratio for a career is markedly skewed compared to their middle class peers.
It's really bad with jobs that expect you to "pay your dues" at the beginning, yet still socialize with co-workers at restaurants after work. People from a more modest background are seen as anti-social when they really just have a cash flow problem.
There's a negative feedback loop.
I think this article is preaching to the wrong crowd here on HN. A entrepreneur is by definition an upstart, an usurper who is out to break the conventions. You can't do this by being a quite yes man. That said what percentage of entrepreneurs, successful or not come from rich backgrounds? This article's ideas would apply two fold to the startup arena where you cannot get anywhere simply by running on the hamster whe…
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Modern logistics (c.f. Walmart) is a hugely significant technological breakthrough, and is arguably the foundation of our modern economy. It's not obvious to consumers because it happened behind the scenes, but don't neglect it's significance.
Modern logistics developed mainly during the Second World War and post-war period, along with the computer revolution. My point is however that the last few decades have seen a refinement of more revolutionary changes in the first half of the twentieth century. For example, from 1902 - 1960 we went from the Kitty Hawk to the jet passenger plane. From 1960 we went from the jet plane to .... ? We're still flying around…
In any case the standards of technology are always the thing that's changing the fastest. In the early 20th century, it was transport and chemistry. Today it's computing and biotechnology.
"I believe my generation will overthrow the arbitrary and brutal authority of corporate capitalism and bigoted conservatism in favor of rationalistic, libertarian socialism driven by a scientific approach and a concern for universal social justice." That's what my generation believed. And my parents' generation. And their parents....read some literature from 100 years ago, for example by the Fabians or other socialis…
The point of the OP was IF the rich kid works just like the regular kid, then he'll still be ahead.
Let's assume the two kids are just as driven as each other, with the rich kids having more opportunities. I do not believe that the rich kid will always have the social skills, technical skills, brains, passion, or dedication to take advantage of those opportunities. The rich kid may be a very mediocre person by merit, but because the regular kid doesn't have access to these opportunities, our society will select the rich kid for this opportunity because he looks good on paper and for lack of other merited kids to pick from. So yes, the rich kid will be ahead PURELY because he had exclusive access to an opportunity or because society wanted to pick a better resume, but NOT because the rich kid has a better skill set or is more well adjusted than the regular kid based on their wealth backgrounds. This disproves the OP's point.
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You're surprised that people on an entrepreneurship website are capitalists?
Maybe he is surprised that young, smart, poor ppl are capitalists.
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The bartender does that only until he gets busted by a police sting operation. A good friend of mine had his nascent teaching career destroyed when he some confident-looking 20 year old chick dropped a 6 pack of Bud Light on the counter of the store he managed part-time. He didn't bother asking for ID (which he was typically pretty strict about) and was led out in cuffs. He received a conditional dismissal after 3 ye…
Where the hell do you live, Singapore? That law is draconian.
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I'm not rich, neither can I cite evidence to back this up, but looking around in my circle of friends, I don't agree with you. Rich(er) kids have just as much drive to work on interesting products, find new solutions to problems, etc. And they have the added benefit of not having to worry about making a baseline salary on the side, they can ask their parents to bootstrap them, to find first clients, etc. Sure you can…
Allow me to rephrase then: to the extent that lack of comfort/possessions motivates people to strive for better, rich kids will experience less motivation from that source. Of course they can always find motivation from other sources. I suppose you could also argue that everyone is motivated to maintain their current standards of living, rather than (or more than) elevate to something higher. So rich kids will find i…
When you ask a person what motivates others, they talk about things at the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy.
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Nice personal attack right there. Try addressing his argument next time. And FYI, sociologically speaking, most corporations are brutal psychopats.
Absolutely agree with you that he should address his argument. That said, this is almost too obvious to point out, but it happens to be true that the Soviet Union and Communist China (and Vietnam, Cambodia, etcetera) murdered 100 million+[1] in the name of "building socialism", and it is quite possible that the original poster knows people from those countries who lost loved ones to socialism/communism. Seen in this…
Stalinism is just one branch of communism and it is such an obvious failure that generalizing it and making it the one and only true communism just shows your ignorance about what socialism is and isn't.
So one branch of communism, one that favours a dictatorship and favours state-owned property instead of public-property (which anarchism and other branches of communism favour), has killed millions.
It is idealistic to support socialism, it's ignorant to support Stalinism or Maoism or whatever dictatorship-favouring branch of communism you want to refer to. Generalizing that garbage is worse than ignorant.