People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige • Hacker News Board

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#191

Post by beamatronic » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:26 PM UTC

asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #175

throwawayjava wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's helpful to remember that the Bay Area is extremely expensive, and even more helpful to remember that some people have large families. I could pretty comfortably raise a family of 6 on $100K in a midwestern city, or a family of 6 on $80K in the rural midwest/south. Without sufficient retirement savings, mind you, and my safety net would be non-exisent. I'd need at least another $30K-$50K on those numbers to build…

> Doing the same in SFBA would probably require at least $250K. Maybe more. Why? Each child might consume, generously, an extra 5k of food and 2.5k of clothes and other inputs per year. This is an increment of $30k on top of housing. For housing, you could add one or at most two bedrooms for four children. This does substantially raise housing costs, but there are still places in Sunnyvale for $1M or just above that…

Cheap homes in the Bay Area have terrible schools. You’ll need to factor in private school if you go that route. That’s $25k per kid per year.

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#192

Post by pretendscholar » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:29 PM UTC

wenc wrote: post #143

nickthemagicman wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gates Musk and Jobs all came from rich families and were able to work on what they wanted to work on. The people going for prestigious institutions may actually need a job and and are optimizing for the best possible outcome.

Gates did. Not sure either Musk or Jobs had rich families. You may want to check that.

>Not sure either Musk or Jobs had rich families. You may want to check that.

Doesn't that mean you should be the one checking?

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#193

Post by sir_kin » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:30 PM UTC

wenc wrote: post #143

nickthemagicman wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gates Musk and Jobs all came from rich families and were able to work on what they wanted to work on. The people going for prestigious institutions may actually need a job and and are optimizing for the best possible outcome.

Gates did. Not sure either Musk or Jobs had rich families. You may want to check that.

Musk 100% comes from wealth [1].

In America, there's the whole mythos of the rags-to-riches American dream. Some people whose story is really riches-to-more-riches present their success as the former.

[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musks-dad-tells-bi-abou...

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#194

Post by ALittleLight » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:30 PM UTC

lordleft wrote: post #174

“People who are excited by posthumous fame forget that the people who remember them will soon die too. And those after them in turn. Until their memory, passed from one to another like a candle flame, gutters and goes out.” Marcus Aurelius "19. You may be unconquerable, if you enter into no combat in which it is not in your own control to conquer. When, therefore, you see anyone eminent in honors, or power, or in hig…

The Aurelius quote is a bit ironic since Aurelius is still remembered despite the passage of many generations.

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#195

Post by bsanr2 » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:31 PM UTC

asdfman123 wrote: post #94

astuyvenberg wrote: post #7

This post also resonated with me, especially the quote from /r/cscareerquestions > Got an awesome internship at an interesting company? Well, it wasn’t FAANG, so who cares? Got a FAANG internship? Well it wasn’t one of the good FAANGs, so if you really think about it, you really didn’t accomplish anything. Got into a “Good FAANG”? Well, the other intern works on his own startup idea when he goes home. Why aren’t you…

I've noticed something about subreddits that focus on lifestyle design and center around advice: they all start to converge on fairly narrow groupthink. /r/personalfinance is all about super frugal living and passive investing. In /r/backpacking, the general advice is to go as light as possible and spend money reducing weight. /r/cscareerquestions is about the leetcode grind and getting into FAANG. /r/malefashionadvi…

>My brother and I were from a normal middle class background but both went to fancy private schools.

I find that people tend to either over or underestimate the "middle class"iness of their upbringing.

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#196

Post by leoh » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:32 PM UTC

ALittleLight wrote: post #194

lordleft wrote: post #174

“People who are excited by posthumous fame forget that the people who remember them will soon die too. And those after them in turn. Until their memory, passed from one to another like a candle flame, gutters and goes out.” Marcus Aurelius "19. You may be unconquerable, if you enter into no combat in which it is not in your own control to conquer. When, therefore, you see anyone eminent in honors, or power, or in hig…

The Aurelius quote is a bit ironic since Aurelius is still remembered despite the passage of many generations.

Yes, but would you listen to someone who wasn't?

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#197

Post by saiya-jin » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:35 PM UTC

theFeller00 wrote: post #160

saiya-jin wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol that's not how getting rich actually works. People get quickly used to new income, a bit better phones, clothing, cars, vacations etc. Plus 50% increase doesn't actually translate to 50% net income, taxes % go up in most western world pretty steeply, so the jump is not that big. This isn't valid for 100% of the folks obviously, but say 90% fall into this trap one way or the other. It is paradoxically easiest for…

Unless you're just doing the passive index fund thing, which there is obviously nothing wrong with, I don't think many understand the stress levels that come from trading. Insane highs. Insane lows. Lows you will eat at you for years.

Nothing with trading, I don't have mentality to thrive there. Still doing IT, still +- same job, just started low and gradually moved to much better place. Plus (I would like to think that) I know how to negotiate salary during hiring. Or maybe just luck, can't really say.

Not even self-employed, which is great but goes opposite to stability, and some goals I have in life are not financial.

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#198

Post by kangnkodos » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:35 PM UTC

saiya-jin wrote: post #63

akhilcacharya wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely. Purchasing real estate (or even a Tesla, etc) is out of reach for people like me, and likely will be for 10+ years from now. Say someone makes 150% or more of what I make (ergo are valued 150% superior in a fair labor market) and they can save far more and build a their net worth significantly faster even with a more luxurious lifestyle.

Lol that's not how getting rich actually works. People get quickly used to new income, a bit better phones, clothing, cars, vacations etc. Plus 50% increase doesn't actually translate to 50% net income, taxes % go up in most western world pretty steeply, so the jump is not that big. This isn't valid for 100% of the folks obviously, but say 95% fall into this trap one way or the other. It is paradoxically easiest for…

Nah. That's just sour grapes. Saying that more money leads to less long term happiness and life satisfaction. It's not true. It's not hard at at all to find good investments. If you have some money, and are willing to take some risks, your investments will grow. The rich get richer. It's a law of nature.

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#199

Post by michalf6 » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:38 PM UTC

bumby wrote: post #168

From David Brooks: "I’ve been thinking about the difference between the résumé virtues and the eulogy virtues. The résumé virtues are the ones you list on your résumé, the skills that you bring to the job market and that contribute to external success. The eulogy virtues are deeper. They’re the virtues that get talked about at your funeral, the ones that exist at the core of your being — whether you are kind, brave,…

Thing is, by the time your eulogy is written, you're already dead. I prefer to leave my kids with a tangible legacy than a beautiful story of a guy who was too kind to be a dick when he needed to.

Besides, words chosen for your eulogy depend on the influence you managed to build while still living.

Re: People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

#200

Post by TheHegemon » Tue, Jan 07, 2020, 4:38 PM UTC

bsanr2 wrote: post #195

asdfman123 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've noticed something about subreddits that focus on lifestyle design and center around advice: they all start to converge on fairly narrow groupthink. /r/personalfinance is all about super frugal living and passive investing. In /r/backpacking, the general advice is to go as light as possible and spend money reducing weight. /r/cscareerquestions is about the leetcode grind and getting into FAANG. /r/malefashionadvi…

>My brother and I were from a normal middle class background but both went to fancy private schools. I find that people tend to either over or underestimate the "middle class"iness of their upbringing.

Seriously, these two things do not go in hand in my mind.