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Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

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Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#251

Post by inglor_cz »

rurp wrote: post #157
laurent92 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The social elevator can take 2 generations. And that is ok. There is a lot of things to learn. It gives hope to one’s dad. Sadly inheritance is looked down upon, and people would like every citizen to be born with the same information, and this information being delivered by public education. Sadly, parents teach much better than teachers when it is about the little things that make a life successful. There will neve…

> 86% billionaires of our generation didn’t have billionaire parents. How many of them had hundred-millionaire parents? The way wealth has grown for the super rich over the past few decades is staggering. Children of wealthy parents attaining far greater wealth than their parents has been the norm in America for generations now, it's not some exceptional accomplishment.

I don't think that multiplying your parents' wealth is only confined to the already wealthy class.

I make about ten times as much as my mother did, although we are both university educated. The difference is that I can sell my products on the Internet to a much wider audience. That was a serious multiplier which affected a lot of people and businesses, even on the lower end of the scale.

But I am very definitely not a USD-millionaire and likely won't ever be.

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#252

Post by tru3_power »

paulsutter wrote: post #84

Folks in the status professions (banking, law,..) often tell me they want to become an entrepreneur. I always tell them, you wont do it. They attended the right school, joined the right firm, attained that corner office. As a founder they would give up all that, and their family and friends will tell them that they've made a massive mistake, for years, while it appears that nothing is happening. Then they sheepishly…

How did you survive initially without a steady source of income?

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#253

Post by rootusrootus »

OJFord wrote: post #200
rootusrootus wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally, I suspect a few people hosed themselves this year in the stock market. I met a few people early on in the pandemic who thought themselves very smart for paying attention to the news and getting their money out of the market before the first big drop. Admittedly, I haven't talked to them since, but they didn't seem to expect it to bounce right back up again. I wonder how many people out there did somethin…

That's why I emphasised started in March. As in started putting new money in in at or around the low, I think plenty of that happened. Frankly I'm kicking myself for not doing as you say. I 'thought myself very smart' by being aware of it over the new year, reading how bad it will be, thinking markets will tank, and sticking to my guns because 'I won't try to time the dip'. And then of course with a modest amount of…

> Where the latter should be funded appropriately for what it is, a hobby.

Agree 100%. The vast majority of my savings goes into an index fund and I keep on adding to it like clockwork every paycheck, and I avoid even thinking about it. I very specifically kept my fingers away from the keyboard when the pandemic was unfolding. I do like to play stocks for fun however, even options when I'm feeling spicy, but I do that with my 'lunch money' aka hobby money I'd have just spent on something else.

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#254

Post by gumby »

gonehome wrote: post #149
paulsutter wrote: post #84

Folks in the status professions (banking, law,..) often tell me they want to become an entrepreneur. I always tell them, you wont do it. They attended the right school, joined the right firm, attained that corner office. As a founder they would give up all that, and their family and friends will tell them that they've made a massive mistake, for years, while it appears that nothing is happening. Then they sheepishly…

Arguably a lot of people are driven to be entrepreneurs because of the status. The issue with the bankers is that they’re trapped in a local maximum. A successful entrepreneur is probably the highest status role possible in modern society (think Zuckerberg, Bezos, Gates) maybe even rivaling POTUS. I don’t buy that entrepreneurs are not interested in status, they’re just making a longer term status play (and taking on…

> Arguably a lot of people are driven to be entrepreneurs because of the status.

and it was a lot more fun doing it when it had no status at all.

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#255

Post by chmod600 »

reducesuffering wrote: post #231
chmod600 wrote: post #204

I'll always remember growing up when we moved from a big house (2000 sq ft) to a little apartment (700 sq ft). My parents didn't lose their jobs, maybe a few expensive things hit but really there was no obvious reason to an outsider. We could have stayed in the big house and gotten by. But our family wasn't in great financial shape. Small expenses became debts, parents always fighting or stressed about money, just ge…

Was this a 4 person family in a 2 bedroom apartment?

5 people in two bedrooms, youngest 14, so it was a bit tight. But honestly I don't remember it as a problem. I was a teenager and more concerned with other stuff.

The point is not that the living condiitions were bad. They weren't. We had what we needed and more.

The point is that my parents were wise enough to cast off the things that didn't matter before they were forced to, and focus on what did matter. They didn't care what the neighbors or friends or aunts and uncles thought.

How many people willingly drop themselves down a few rungs on the social ladder for anything? Even for stuff that matters much more, like their family's financial security, happiness, and freedom?

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#256

Post by TheCoelacanth »

SilasX wrote: post #192
K0balt wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I prefer "gainfully unemployed" or "willfully unemployable". Those are the labels I have become comfortable with.

I've started using the term "Mitt Romney unemployed" for "not working but no pressing need to", as a reference to his famous gaffe about "I know all about unemployment! Heck, I'm unemployed, myself!" https://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2011/06/17/romney-ribbe...

Why not just stick to the classic "idle rich"?

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#257

Post by nickthemagicman »

bonecrusher2102 wrote: post #64
nickthemagicman wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech is nice because it's tedious and can be difficult and for rich high status people, an easier quicker way to more guaranteed status is Medicine or Law. Your summary is both a good point and a little chilling. I've always wondered in Capitalism how this concept of a JOB for people to have a living wage is sustainable in modern times. Much less for people to innovate and thrive.

I'd contend that getting licence to practice law or medicine is neither quick nor easy. Tech definitely has a lower barrier to entry and has plenty of positions that are far less tedious than equivalent (in terms of pay and status) careers in law and medicine.

I think there's much higher status in the average person in law or medicine versus the average tech person.

I don't think you can really have that same kind of status in tech without building something very significant which typically takes years of experience.

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#258

Post by robocat »

klmadfejno wrote: post #220
paulsutter wrote: post #84

Folks in the status professions (banking, law,..) often tell me they want to become an entrepreneur. I always tell them, you wont do it. They attended the right school, joined the right firm, attained that corner office. As a founder they would give up all that, and their family and friends will tell them that they've made a massive mistake, for years, while it appears that nothing is happening. Then they sheepishly…

I'm in a relatively high status career, followed that just right path, and more or less planned it all out since middle school. For what its worth, I don't give a crap about status. I think most of my peers don't either, at least relative to the past. I think materialism and arbitrary status seeking is one the decline for the young professional. High end professional fashion and fancy watches are nowhere to be seen i…

> High end professional fashion and fancy watches are nowhere to be seen in my office

Status symbols drastically change between generations. The question is: what are the status symbols of your peer group?

My impression is that as you move up in earnings (or perhaps with age?), the symbols of status become more esoteric.

One female friend of mine wants to start a yoga studio: that appears to me to be a particularly alpha-female status seeking activity in her social circle.

And the definition of what are status symbols is extremely dependent upon the group, and the symbols are not always visible or obvious. One symbol that seems invariant between different cliques (although somewhat recursive) is having a high status partner.

The clearest status symbol across different groups is whether high status individuals within the group (or globally high status people) spend time with you. Name dropping. Audience seeking.

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#259

Post by 908B64B197 »

ativzzz wrote: post #211
kyawzazaw wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think OP meant leetcode is the gatekeeper for software engineers working at a big tech corp or a smaller one where compensation and the career path can vary wildly.

Exactly what I meant

I think people conflate LeetCode with basic programming skills...

Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status

#260

Post by stuntkite »

sidlls wrote: post #139
laurent92 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The social elevator can take 2 generations. And that is ok. There is a lot of things to learn. It gives hope to one’s dad. Sadly inheritance is looked down upon, and people would like every citizen to be born with the same information, and this information being delivered by public education. Sadly, parents teach much better than teachers when it is about the little things that make a life successful. There will neve…

There are three ideas core to your comment that are, at best, controversial: marriage as a predictor of success, French-born developers are lazy, and wealth/social exclusion having no role in whether "having the right parents" applies. Also I'd love to see a deeper analysis of your "86% of billionaires" comment. Usually what happens is we discover that "self-made" millionaires grew up in quite affluent circumstances,…

I think the "86% of billionaires" thing can be attributed to wealth concentration to income gap. If you want to be a billionaire, it helps if your family had many millions. The extraction of the ultra wealthy that has happened in the last 40 years is pretty incredible. I'm unsure that there are any billionaires that started out leaving home as an emancipated minor with no job and no money an an early life of untreated trauma resulting in complex PTSD.
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