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Discussions like these seem to miss the critical difference between individually and socially rational incentives and behaviors. Surely, given you at least live

Discussions like these seem to miss the critical difference between individually and socially rational incentives and behaviors. Surely, given you at least live in a place that is sufficiently secure and stable with liberal markets and access to capital, anyone can get rich by following in the footsteps of the investor class. It is definitely not the case that everyone can get rich this way. If all 8 billion people on the planet did nothing but shuffle around paper ownership claims, there would be nothing to actually own. For an economy to produce anything at all, the vast majority of participants need to be on the ground making stuff, with only a tiny vanishing few shuffling paper at the top to decide who gets to own the inputs and outputs. Maybe we'll actually reach some future where all production and maintenance labor is fully automated and most participants in an economy won't be human and we can just ethically enslave them for the benefit of human owners, but we're nowhere near that point. I'm living right now in a hotbed of construction, a rapid growth metro, and I'm in the middle of it. Three lots I can see from my bedroom window are being leveled and turned into townhouses. That work is being done by people. They certainly have machine work multipliers. Nobody is carrying lumber and stone by hand from quarries to job site. Nobody is leveling the earth with shovels and trowels. But the bobcats and trucks are still operated by humans. Pipe is laid by humans. Walls are erected by humans. If all those people tried to do my job instead and became coders, or worse, tried to become investors, I and all the investors would be left with nowhere to live because no one would be building houses. We'd have no water or electricity if no one was laying the pipes and lines. At some point, we should realize this and attempt to have an economy that recognizes most people in the economy have to be doing basic labor for there to be an economy at all, and figure out a way to accomplish this without these people needing to live paycheck to paycheck with the looming threat of a medical emergency able to wipe them out permanently. We can't just tell them to all change their focus from doing work to building wealth, because if they actually all do that, there will no longer be any wealth.

spfzero 5y ago
I think you've pointed out the fourth kind of luck, as described in the article. The people building the houses, driving the Bobcats, have a skill they've developed over time through their effort, that now affords them employment. If you know how to do something, and someone needs that, they're going to call you up and ask you if you'd like to do that thing for some amount of time for some amount of money. So that ability is a form of wealth. I don't think he's talking about everyone in the world becoming passive investors; kind of the opposite actually.
- vlovich123 5y ago
  That literally is not what the author wrote though. He said that “if you’re the best at something and you’re connected with someone that needs that skill” then you’ll get some wealth potentially. That’s not the same as learning a trade that is easily accessible and attainable by anyone interested. What the author basically says in the article is “be part of the owner class generating wealth or you are a parasite”. Talk about playing the very same status games he claims to eschew.
  - danlugo92 5y ago
    > a trade that is easily accessible and attainable by anyone interested. There's sufficient trades that people could go and pick up that pay well yet they don't.
    - vlovich123 5y ago
      Have you read the article? It’s discussing wealth. Learning a trade is literally not what it’s about. It’s taking about how you should try to find ways for wealth generation to be a passive enterprise, but with an extremely toxic perspective.
eloff 5y ago
I feel like you didn't read or listen to the content. Naval is not suggesting you have to be an investor to get rich. But you do have to do something that gives you leverage, like starting a company. You're not going to get rich renting your time to an employer (unless you get lucky with stock options, or investing your income, but that's back to the point about leverage.)
- SyzygistSix 5y ago
  So what does a world where no one is renting their time look like?
  - paulpauper 5y ago
    it is a meaningless/nonsensical statement
- paulpauper 5y ago
  >You're not going to get rich renting your time to an employer poor goldman sachs execs. how ripepd off they are to only be making millions/year when they could fire thier boss and start a subway franchise. poor a-list actors only making $20/million per film. Most small businesses,startups fail. Odds are a doctor making 7-figures will become more rich compared to an entrepreneur who dropped out of college.
  - mehphp 5y ago
    Why the pedantry? Those examples are exceedingly rare.
    - paulpauper 5y ago
      being a doctor is rare?
      - mehphp 5y ago
        Yes, becoming a wealthy doctor is rare. Again, the original point isn’t that it’s impossible to get rich by selling your time but that you’ll most likely need some leverage (i.e. in the form of owning a business)
qzw 5y ago
> Maybe we'll actually reach some future where all production and maintenance labor is fully automated and most participants in an economy won't be human and we can just ethically enslave them for the benefit of human owners, but we're nowhere near that point. It’s equally likely that in such a future most people will be on some version of UBI that allows them to get by, but wealth, in whatever form it takes, will still be limited to a relatively small subset of people. There’s no reason to believe that the robots/AGI/whatever means of production will naturally be owned collectively rather than privately. I hope the future turns out better, but there seems to be something in human nature that makes inequity tend to stick around.
- ben_w 5y ago
  > There’s no reason to believe that the robots/AGI/whatever means of production will naturally be owned collectively rather than privately. I think that depends on the tech and what it can do. If we get a general purpose construction robot that can also make copies of itself — be that a 3D printer with some manual assembly required once the parts come out, or a genetically engineered programmable moss, or bioprinted fairy drones with microchips for brains — anything like that has close to no marginal cost to give to everyone rather than just to the rich. If we never get von Neumann tech? Then sure, I agree with you.
  - swader999 5y ago
    The navies zero point energy patents perhaps. How else would they get those triangles in the skies?
  - pkdpic_y9k 5y ago
    Uhh... You had me at "bioprinted fairy drones" Please give a website, blog or book recommendation so I can become your humble disciple.
    - ben_w 5y ago
      Thanks for the vote of confidence! It inspired me to go and write a blog post for this: https://kitsunesoftware.wordpress.com/2021/05/22/bioprinted-fairy-drones/ https://kitsunesoftware.wordpress.com/2021/05/22/bioprinted-...
foogazi 5y ago
> and figure out a way to accomplish this without these people needing to live paycheck to paycheck Why not let them figure it out themselves ? Also, no one “needs” to live paycheck to paycheck, just like no one needs to make bad investments, but it happens maybe someone googles “how to get rich” and finds Naval’s advice. People can decide if it’s worthwhile for them
- srswtf123 5y ago
  > Also, no one “needs” to live paycheck to paycheck Your disconnect from reality is showing.
  - godfreyantonell 5y ago
    I suppose in the same way as no one "needs to" live.
- cortesoft 5y ago
  No particular individual needs to to be those things, but the structure of our society requires SOME people to be those things.
ItsMonkk 5y ago
The author is mostly right, in this meta the best thing you can do is leverage as much as you can and pray that it doesn't burst at the wrong time. But that takes luck. Incentives drive behavior. If you perverse the incentives, the economy will follow. Why is our productivity growth at all time lows? Because our best are figuring out how to get people to click ads. Our best are trying to work out exactly which financial product will go up the most safely. When the increase of the money supply outpaces the increase in productivity, everyone mistakes leverage for genius.
burntoutfire 5y ago
> figure out a way to accomplish this without these people needing to live paycheck to paycheck with the looming threat of a medical emergency able to wipe them out permanently. This is basically how you make people do very sucky jobs, such as construction. Almost no one does it because they like it - they do it because they see no better options. Countries with very rich societies (e.g. some Arab countries) don't have enough people who have no other choice and hence have to bring in plenty of migrants as otherwise the construction wouldn't happen.
dqpb 5y ago
You can simultaneously have a labor job and trade equities.

spfzero 5y ago

I think you've pointed out the fourth kind of luck, as described in the article. The people building the houses, driving the Bobcats, have a skill they've developed over time through their effort, that now affords them employment. If you know how to do something, and someone needs that, they're going to call you up and ask you if you'd like to do that thing for some amount of time for some amount of money. So that ability is a form of wealth. I don't think he's talking about everyone in the world becoming passive investors; kind of the opposite actually.

vlovich123 5y ago
That literally is not what the author wrote though. He said that “if you’re the best at something and you’re connected with someone that needs that skill” then you’ll get some wealth potentially. That’s not the same as learning a trade that is easily accessible and attainable by anyone interested. What the author basically says in the article is “be part of the owner class generating wealth or you are a parasite”. Talk about playing the very same status games he claims to eschew.
- danlugo92 5y ago
  > a trade that is easily accessible and attainable by anyone interested. There's sufficient trades that people could go and pick up that pay well yet they don't.
  - vlovich123 5y ago
    Have you read the article? It’s discussing wealth. Learning a trade is literally not what it’s about. It’s taking about how you should try to find ways for wealth generation to be a passive enterprise, but with an extremely toxic perspective.

eloff 5y ago

I feel like you didn't read or listen to the content. Naval is not suggesting you have to be an investor to get rich. But you do have to do something that gives you leverage, like starting a company. You're not going to get rich renting your time to an employer (unless you get lucky with stock options, or investing your income, but that's back to the point about leverage.)

SyzygistSix 5y ago
So what does a world where no one is renting their time look like?
- paulpauper 5y ago
  it is a meaningless/nonsensical statement
paulpauper 5y ago
>You're not going to get rich renting your time to an employer poor goldman sachs execs. how ripepd off they are to only be making millions/year when they could fire thier boss and start a subway franchise. poor a-list actors only making $20/million per film. Most small businesses,startups fail. Odds are a doctor making 7-figures will become more rich compared to an entrepreneur who dropped out of college.
- mehphp 5y ago
  Why the pedantry? Those examples are exceedingly rare.
  - paulpauper 5y ago
    being a doctor is rare?
    - mehphp 5y ago
      Yes, becoming a wealthy doctor is rare. Again, the original point isn’t that it’s impossible to get rich by selling your time but that you’ll most likely need some leverage (i.e. in the form of owning a business)

qzw 5y ago

> Maybe we'll actually reach some future where all production and maintenance labor is fully automated and most participants in an economy won't be human and we can just ethically enslave them for the benefit of human owners, but we're nowhere near that point. It’s equally likely that in such a future most people will be on some version of UBI that allows them to get by, but wealth, in whatever form it takes, will still be limited to a relatively small subset of people. There’s no reason to believe that the robots/AGI/whatever means of production will naturally be owned collectively rather than privately. I hope the future turns out better, but there seems to be something in human nature that makes inequity tend to stick around.

ben_w 5y ago
> There’s no reason to believe that the robots/AGI/whatever means of production will naturally be owned collectively rather than privately. I think that depends on the tech and what it can do. If we get a general purpose construction robot that can also make copies of itself — be that a 3D printer with some manual assembly required once the parts come out, or a genetically engineered programmable moss, or bioprinted fairy drones with microchips for brains — anything like that has close to no marginal cost to give to everyone rather than just to the rich. If we never get von Neumann tech? Then sure, I agree with you.
- swader999 5y ago
  The navies zero point energy patents perhaps. How else would they get those triangles in the skies?
- pkdpic_y9k 5y ago
  Uhh... You had me at "bioprinted fairy drones" Please give a website, blog or book recommendation so I can become your humble disciple.
  - ben_w 5y ago
    Thanks for the vote of confidence! It inspired me to go and write a blog post for this: https://kitsunesoftware.wordpress.com/2021/05/22/bioprinted-fairy-drones/ https://kitsunesoftware.wordpress.com/2021/05/22/bioprinted-...

foogazi 5y ago

> and figure out a way to accomplish this without these people needing to live paycheck to paycheck Why not let them figure it out themselves ? Also, no one “needs” to live paycheck to paycheck, just like no one needs to make bad investments, but it happens maybe someone googles “how to get rich” and finds Naval’s advice. People can decide if it’s worthwhile for them

srswtf123 5y ago
> Also, no one “needs” to live paycheck to paycheck Your disconnect from reality is showing.
- godfreyantonell 5y ago
  I suppose in the same way as no one "needs to" live.
cortesoft 5y ago
No particular individual needs to to be those things, but the structure of our society requires SOME people to be those things.

ItsMonkk 5y ago

The author is mostly right, in this meta the best thing you can do is leverage as much as you can and pray that it doesn't burst at the wrong time. But that takes luck. Incentives drive behavior. If you perverse the incentives, the economy will follow. Why is our productivity growth at all time lows? Because our best are figuring out how to get people to click ads. Our best are trying to work out exactly which financial product will go up the most safely. When the increase of the money supply outpaces the increase in productivity, everyone mistakes leverage for genius.

burntoutfire 5y ago

> figure out a way to accomplish this without these people needing to live paycheck to paycheck with the looming threat of a medical emergency able to wipe them out permanently. This is basically how you make people do very sucky jobs, such as construction. Almost no one does it because they like it - they do it because they see no better options. Countries with very rich societies (e.g. some Arab countries) don't have enough people who have no other choice and hence have to bring in plenty of migrants as otherwise the construction wouldn't happen.

dqpb 5y ago

You can simultaneously have a labor job and trade equities.