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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

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 in my office (well, pre-covid at least). Sure, there's social media doing its thing, but in the grand scheme of things it's importance to the average person's self image is small. I do care about access to high paying wages with work that gradually grows more high level over time. I do think working at a startup could be more fun, but I don't think it'd be a good idea worth doing, ever, given what I've got now. I am happy with what I've got. I make a chunk less than $200k, which isn't close to the very top tiers, but it's way more than I need. Yeah, probably could have gotten even more going a CS FANG route or a lucrative start up that just works. But personally I think everything more or less went as planned and I think that's great. I wouldn't go assuming that folks in similar positions aren't aware of the calculus here either. If someone says running a startup sounds really interesting, that's because there's a lot of cool stuff in it. The same could be said of being a commercial fisherman, or being a detective, or running a small restaurant. I mean running a small restaurant sounds awesome. But it also probably sucks. If someone asks me about it, I'm likely to focus on the positives. I'm not exactly being asked to sign my name on a career form here. If you decide to call me out on not actually wanting to drop my lucrative career for that startup/restaurant/fish boat, that's not me being sheepish, that's me trying to downplay an uncomfortable situation coupled with an apparent assumption that I'm unaware of my own vanity for status :/

bumby 6y ago
>High end professional fashion and fancy watches are nowhere to be seen in my office Do you think the status drive is the same, just replaced with different signals? I've often wondered if a lot of it is almost generationally defined. Boomers grew up in a time where cars were a major status symbol, but there's a high percentage of younger generations that don't even care to own a car. Based on what you stated, I wonder if the materialism has just been replaced by an experiential sense of status (e.g., who has the best Instagram-worthy vacation to share, or who has the coolest start-up story to tell, or the most 'artisan' career). I'm not claiming to know, just curious if these are just different means to the same end defined as the esteem of our collegues
- klmadfejno 6y ago
  This may be coming hard from my particular beliefs, but I think its a byproduct of diversification efforts bearing fruit. It used to be all white dudes or non-white dudes playing the white dude game. I think the diversity of people in visible traits has encouraged diversity in viewpoints and norms and whatever. It's much easier to play your own game when it's 1v1v1v1v1v1 instead of 4v1. Norms are softer. And that's good. There's definitely some sort of anti-materialism cultural movement. I don't know how to judge the instagram status game. It's big, and growing, but it's also totally optional. You don't come off as a low status individual if you don't even have an instagram account to the same degree as someone who walks in with a non-professional looking pair of shoes. If nobody knows what my insta-status is (as a non user), and I don't know what anyone else's is... is it really a good measure of status or is it just kind its own thing? Aside from the top few percent of individuals who are basically professional social media players, I'm not sure insta-fame amounts to much more than being a guild master in a particularly popular MMORPG. Kind of cool but hardly universal.
robocat 6y ago
> 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.

bumby 6y ago

>High end professional fashion and fancy watches are nowhere to be seen in my office Do you think the status drive is the same, just replaced with different signals? I've often wondered if a lot of it is almost generationally defined. Boomers grew up in a time where cars were a major status symbol, but there's a high percentage of younger generations that don't even care to own a car. Based on what you stated, I wonder if the materialism has just been replaced by an experiential sense of status (e.g., who has the best Instagram-worthy vacation to share, or who has the coolest start-up story to tell, or the most 'artisan' career). I'm not claiming to know, just curious if these are just different means to the same end defined as the esteem of our collegues

klmadfejno 6y ago
This may be coming hard from my particular beliefs, but I think its a byproduct of diversification efforts bearing fruit. It used to be all white dudes or non-white dudes playing the white dude game. I think the diversity of people in visible traits has encouraged diversity in viewpoints and norms and whatever. It's much easier to play your own game when it's 1v1v1v1v1v1 instead of 4v1. Norms are softer. And that's good. There's definitely some sort of anti-materialism cultural movement. I don't know how to judge the instagram status game. It's big, and growing, but it's also totally optional. You don't come off as a low status individual if you don't even have an instagram account to the same degree as someone who walks in with a non-professional looking pair of shoes. If nobody knows what my insta-status is (as a non user), and I don't know what anyone else's is... is it really a good measure of status or is it just kind its own thing? Aside from the top few percent of individuals who are basically professional social media players, I'm not sure insta-fame amounts to much more than being a guild master in a particularly popular MMORPG. Kind of cool but hardly universal.

robocat 6y ago

> 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.