Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life • Hacker News Board

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#281

Post by caf » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 1:58 PM UTC

fullstop wrote: post #221

jasonkester wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. I have a friend whos whole extended family kept telling her that she should stop with this fancy expensive state college education and go to a trade school or something that would get her a job. Even when she was working at an engineering firm and starting to see the payoff, her family kept trying to drag her down. Fortunately, she had a particularly strong will, so she spent just as much time telling them wh…

On the flip side there are plenty of examples of kids being pushed into higher education who would have been much better off going to a trade school. Working as a plumber, an electrician, or a carpenter can be quite lucrative, and they are certainly things that society needs. Being pushed into higher ed is so much different than having an internal drive to do it. I'm glad that she's doing well and hopefully they can…

Working as a plumber, an electrician, or a carpenter can be quite lucrative, and they are certainly things that society needs.

I hear this kind of thing, but I have to say it is less than convincing when most of the people saying it don't seem to be sending their kids to trade school.

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#282

Post by dahart » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 1:58 PM UTC

datapls wrote: post #128

52-6F-62 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you’re not counting, and what most people miss, is that not only are you at a disadvantage due to lack of resources, but there are many people in positions of authority, power, or just plain tenure who believe that accumulated wealth is a reflection of the wealth of soul. If you are below them in birth, and didn’t chance yourself to some higher strata by the time they grace your presence, they tend to believe yo…

Show me the data that supports this claim. Big claim, zero citations. As an American I've never met anyone who thinks wealth reflects "wealth of the soul." In my experience people here are Christian, in which case there's that verse about heaven and wealth and the eye of the needle (Google it) or they're atheist and don't believe in souls.

> I’ve never met anyone who things wealth reflects “wealth of the soul.”

I’ve never met anyone who would say exactly those words out loud either, and I don’t speak for the parent, but I feel like you might be taking what was an analogy extremely literally.

Have you ever met or seen someone sneer at a “hippie”? Have you ever heard someone argue that we should not increase the minimum wage? Have you ever heard someone suggest that homeless people are lazy or could get work if they wanted to? Have you ever witnessed anyone saying that the success they have is due primarily to their own hard work, and not for luck or advantages? I’ve seen all of those, often, and they all fit my interpretation of the parent’s comment.

Social Darwinism certainly is a thing and has been for a long time. A quick google about it brought up this article worrying that it’s a growing fad again: http://faculty.etsu.edu/odonnell/2011fall/engl3130/student_w...

Even just Survivor Bias in business - assertions that being better than the competition got them where they are - is relatively close to believing that having money proves you’re a better person. Certainly there’s no lack in the US of fascination with rich people nor of listening to our richest citizens. (How many famous rich people can you name? How many famous poor people?)

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#283

Post by myfavoritedog » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 1:59 PM UTC

themihai wrote: post #137

bko wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you honestly believe this? What would you tell this to someone who wasn't born into wealth or opportunity? You're pretty much screwed, don't bother? What impact do you think teaching nihilism has on children? I don't believe its true, but even if it were, it's not a useful model for life.

>> What would you tell this to someone who wasn't born into wealth or opportunity? You're pretty much screwed, don't bother? I think it's better to be realistic about your chances and it may help to drive the political discourse into the right direction as well. After all this is a political issue. In the end as others have said here it's more important to have a balanced, happy life and good health than to chase the…

than to chase the lotto ticket in a rigged game

That's just a strawman. We're not talking about winning the lottery. This is about whether you improve your outcome by participating in the workforce in some meaningful way.

From the article:

>Despite strong economic performance, a majority of respondents in every developed market do not believe they will be better off in five years’ time.

That shows a disconnect between opportunity out there and people's feeling that they will take part in that opportunity.

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#284

Post by Frost1x » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 1:59 PM UTC

dahart wrote: post #212

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much social mobility we talking? Statistically nobody goes from trailer park to billionare by working hard. You have very, very, good odds of doing better than your parents if you manage to get to age 25 without incurring a felony record, addiction to something that will likely kill you or too many child support payments. edit: I'm only talking about the US

> How much social mobility we talking? ([...] only talking about the US) My college US history course ~20 years ago very much drove home the fact that (at least at the time) social mobility in the US was the same as in India. The surprise, of course, was that India has a caste system, while the US narrative is freedom; if you work hard, you’ll get ahead. I don’t remember the sources, but the rate of social mobility (…

Narrative is important because the language it provides frames a way of life for many who haven't framed their own perspective based on the information they have and haven't seen. It's easy to pickup a narrative, it's far more difficult to dig through and generate your own perspective. It's even more critical because childhood education relies on providing narrative frameworks because children often don't have enough information of processes yet to think critically.

The reason I say this is as you point out, in the US we frame everything as being highly mobile. The illusory framing of our society in "the American dream" in K-12 education and freedoms dangles this carrot of possibility of high social mobility to children. It's not completely invalid, it is possible to make massive transitions in socioeconomic brakets, but it's just a framing of the rare exceptions, not the norms.

Most of us are going to be the norms, so these narratives are a disservice to people about what their real socioeconomic mobility potential and probability is. It's fine to dream, aim high, and shoot for the moon as a society-- that promotes growth and avoids stagnation. At the same time, we should be very clear what is and isn't a moonshot that way many aren't so resentful when they later discover what they thought was reasonable was actually incredibly difficult bordering on impossible. What's possible and what's probable need to be distinguished and the American dream framing doesn't talk to probability.

There's this whole lie painted to children that the US is somehow a meritocracy when it's not. Merit can help, but it isn't everything and we need people to understand this.

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#285

Post by TomGullen » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 1:59 PM UTC

koheripbal wrote: post #246

corry wrote: post #165

As trite as it sounds, "Success = Hard Work + Opportunity" is still the default equation that makes the most sense to me. And while people from all strata of life work very hard, opportunities are obviously and incredibly unequally distributed (and perhaps becoming more so?). If you were born middle-class in US/Canada 20 - 40 years ago, your access to opportunities to improve your station were/are immense. Layer on y…

One thing all tech employees can appreciate is that some people are far more efficient than others. In some cases, by orders of magnitude. You can sort of blend that with "opportunity" if you think it's entirely nurture/education based, but I went to school with a lot of people who had an identical home environment and education as me, and are easily 10x better at coding. There's very little research into how brains…

You could probably add in some luck element as well

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#286

Post by kaladin_1 » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 1:59 PM UTC

traveler01 wrote: post #171

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #56

Every morning, I get up at 5, and go for a two-mile walk. Often, my walk coincides with the route of the garbage collection truck. Man, those dudes work hard . It makes my shoulders ache, just watching them. They are fast, energetic, efficient, and precise. Around here, they are generally Latinos, and they have quite high-paying jobs, compared to a lot of their peers. It's a dirty, dangerous job, and the benefits are…

Meanwhile I work hard and I haven't had a vacation in 3 years. Also my wage sucks too, and I'm a programmer. In my country I believe being in politics would help me way more than working hard. Working hard doesn't help anyone.

Hahahaha

If you said you were Nigerian, I wouldn't be surprised at all. Politicians are the real big shots with few exceptions of course.

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#287

Post by js8 » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 2:00 PM UTC

zests wrote: post #238

laurent123456 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think "starting conditions" includes the parents one has. Also what you say is not quite logic - you're saying that valuing education means people succeed. So why didn't the parents succeed then? I think that's the question, and usually that's because they were born in the wrong place, at the wrong time or under the wrong regime. When their kids are born, it's a different perhaps better time, so better starti…

The parents were immigrants. They were successful -- just not in the way its normally measured.

Don't immigrants show that not only hard work (which they usually did) but other factors (like emigrating from a bad environment, which can be pretty risky) are needed for a better life?

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#288

Post by Zababa » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 2:00 PM UTC

simiones wrote: post #152

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much social mobility we talking? Statistically nobody goes from trailer park to billionare by working hard. You have very, very, good odds of doing better than your parents if you manage to get to age 25 without incurring a felony record, addiction to something that will likely kill you or too many child support payments. edit: I'm only talking about the US

> You have very, very, good odds of doing better than your parents if you manage to get to age 25 without incurring a felony record, addiction to something that will likely kill you or too many child support payments. That is a laughably low bar, and it is unlikely for the trend you are describing to continue past the move from poor to lower middle class. In a fair society, with equality of opportunity, it should be…

> In a fair society, with equality of opportunity, it should be equally likely for a child born in a trailer park to become high income earner as it is for Bill Gate's child.

I don't agree with this. You are measuring equality of outcomes, not of opportunities. They are different.

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#289

Post by JoshTko » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 2:01 PM UTC

dougmwne wrote: post #255

corry wrote: post #165

As trite as it sounds, "Success = Hard Work + Opportunity" is still the default equation that makes the most sense to me. And while people from all strata of life work very hard, opportunities are obviously and incredibly unequally distributed (and perhaps becoming more so?). If you were born middle-class in US/Canada 20 - 40 years ago, your access to opportunities to improve your station were/are immense. Layer on y…

I propose Success = Hard Work * Opportunity^2. That is to say that hard work without opportunity equals nothing and opportunity without work equals nothing. But work and opportunity do not have a linear relationship, a bit more opportunity can greatly leverage a bit of extra work. Big opportunities practically become self-fulfilling. Just look at all the poor students who became president. Their lack of work in schoo…

This cannot be emphasized enough, the equation is multiplicative not additive. Most people have an opportunity of less than 1.

Re: Survey shows people no longer believe working hard will lead to a better life

#290

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jun 15, 2021, 2:01 PM UTC

wishigotitfree wrote: post #25

Starting conditions (where one was born, levels of wealth and opportunity there, one's parents' education and jobs) are shockingly predictive about an individual's future. Hard work leading to social mobility has always been the exception, not the rule. Most will not beat the odds since if they did, those wouldn't BE the odds. A lot of us are just so deluded by survivorship bias borne of listening only to success sto…

[deleted]