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It isn't the thought of not being lucky that makes this sting. It is the connotation among the wealthy that people in poverty aren't working hard enough. It cr

It isn't the thought of not being lucky that makes this sting. It is the connotation among the wealthy that people in poverty aren't working hard enough. It creates an environment where the job creators create jobs with nowhere to go, all the while toting this idea that they create huge opportunity for others. When it isn't true, it causes damage.

BobbyJo 5y ago
No one is creating jobs with nowhere to go on purpose. Business owners create jobs that fulfill the needs of the business in the most cost effective manner possible. For instance, what growth can a mom and pop restaurant or grocery store offer it's employees? None. Is that because they don't think poor people are working hard enough? Of course not.
- zelon88 5y ago
  Then offer them training and experience. Give your best worker a fancy title in lieu of a raise to pad their resume. Enabling someone to grow doesn't mean you get to keep them forever. Unless, of course, you truly are giving people jobs in the hopes that they will have nowhere better to go. Which is also extremely common. I recall a woman who owned a hair salon who asked Bernie Sanders about providing health insurance to her workers. Her point was that she is about to grow her business, but if laws are passed that force her to provide insurance for her employees she won't be able to expand. Bernie let her off easy, but if she had asked me I would have told her that her business obviously isn't providing the kind of value to society that it needs to in order to grow larger. What's the point? To enslave more people that you never intend to provide a living wage too? If you go out of businesses maybe a salon will open that can afford to provide a decent wage to the same employees you take for granted.
  - BobbyJo 5y ago
    Training and experience doing what? What fancy title can you give someone who runs a register at your store to pad their resume? Insurance, sure. That's just another part of comp that you can provide. It's not as straight forward as just money, but it's certainly much easier than training employees for jobs you don't offer.
avidiax 5y ago
Claiming to be "self-made" isn't directly advocating that the poor need only pull harder on their bootstraps, but it's only a few steps apart. If someone believes you can be "self-made" without also necessarily also having a substantial amount of luck, that someone can't explain the gap between success and mere subsistence as anything but "lack of determination", often with a moralistic tone. The very successful shape our society with their influence, which they wield in advancement of their beliefs. If those beliefs are incomplete, or lack empathy, it affects all of us.
- dnautics 5y ago
  the anti-"self-made" rhetoric is eventually going to backfire. There are plenty of people who are only modestly privileged, or even hugely privileged that had to pull through a ton of bullshit or work hundred hour weeks, oftentimes succeeding in spite of what they had to endure, that bristle at the connotation that because they happened to grow up with some amount of privilege, everything they did is unearned. Even if they were wrong and "they would have made it anyways" devaluing someone's effort like what I see happening these days (and moreover, socially pressured to shut up about it) is not a sustainable strategy for ameliorating social disparity.
  - zelon88 5y ago
    Let's look at this scientifically. Being successful takes 100 units of energy. If one monkey starts with 0 units of energy and another monkey starts with 90 units of energy, how many units must each monkey spend to become "successful?" Now imagine the monkey who spent 10 units of energy sitting on Ellen's couch telling the world about how hard he pulled on those bootstraps. Edit: Fixed a typo.
    - dnautics 5y ago
      > "scientifically" I'm sorry. I am actually a former scientist, and I pulled hundred hour workweeks in the lab. You do not know what that word means. Moreover, you completely missed the point.
    - 5y ago
state_less 5y ago
That’s why we ought to give people a sense of the odds. The chance that you’ll be a $400k income earner is somewhere around 1 in 100, so not too likely. You can increase your odds by getting certain kinds of degrees and by living in certain areas, but odds are still going to be against you. I’m not sure how much since I don’t have the conditional probabilities at hand. Try to get your hands on the stats to set your expectations accordingly. Good luck out there!
- username90 5y ago
  The chance gets greatly increased if you are smart though. A smart person with a stem degree is would easily get a $400k salary by joining Google (they mostly test for intelligence so not hard to join for a smart person) and staying for 10 years. "Being born smart is luck" Depends on how you view it, we normally say luck are things that doesn't affect merit. "You were lucky to be born being able to do stuff others can't", well sure but that is how society should work, a person who provides more value should naturally get more of the rewards. Otherwise you'd have to say things like "Einstein discovered all the things he did almost solely thanks to luck!".
  - state_less 5y ago
    Getting a STEM degree is a low probability event, say 1 in 10, then getting in google is another low probability event, say 1 in 10. So making it sound easy/likely seems misleading. I was acknowledging that there are things you can do to improve your odds. Einstein didn’t make it into the Google of his day. He worked as a patent clerk for some time while working on groundbreaking physics until he was accepted. It’s okay to be an average income earner, most are. Don’t get too hung up on something that isn’t likely for you. Also don’t forget what is valued can change. A farmer might be very lucky and valued, by a chance turn of events. If your doing well, be kind and try to raise the floor up for lesser income earners. Maybe they’ll remember you well if you have a turn of bad luck.
  - lumost 5y ago
    Google tests for traditional Computer Science skills taught in a typical set of Algorithms classes at a 4 year degree program. A 400k/yr job at Google hired externally would typically be an individual with 10+ years of experience solving hard problems in production with exposure across organizational, engineering, management, and research domains. It's a fairly recent phenomena that Google began hiring from most universities at the college level, in 2010 they didn't even perform campus recruiting at all of the top-40 universities let alone dedicate valuable phone screen and interview time to candidates outside of top university programs with high GPAs. Hell this is the company founded by Stanford PHDs that famously required industry hires to furnish proof that they held a GPA higher than 3.5!

BobbyJo 5y ago

No one is creating jobs with nowhere to go on purpose. Business owners create jobs that fulfill the needs of the business in the most cost effective manner possible. For instance, what growth can a mom and pop restaurant or grocery store offer it's employees? None. Is that because they don't think poor people are working hard enough? Of course not.

zelon88 5y ago
Then offer them training and experience. Give your best worker a fancy title in lieu of a raise to pad their resume. Enabling someone to grow doesn't mean you get to keep them forever. Unless, of course, you truly are giving people jobs in the hopes that they will have nowhere better to go. Which is also extremely common. I recall a woman who owned a hair salon who asked Bernie Sanders about providing health insurance to her workers. Her point was that she is about to grow her business, but if laws are passed that force her to provide insurance for her employees she won't be able to expand. Bernie let her off easy, but if she had asked me I would have told her that her business obviously isn't providing the kind of value to society that it needs to in order to grow larger. What's the point? To enslave more people that you never intend to provide a living wage too? If you go out of businesses maybe a salon will open that can afford to provide a decent wage to the same employees you take for granted.
- BobbyJo 5y ago
  Training and experience doing what? What fancy title can you give someone who runs a register at your store to pad their resume? Insurance, sure. That's just another part of comp that you can provide. It's not as straight forward as just money, but it's certainly much easier than training employees for jobs you don't offer.

avidiax 5y ago

Claiming to be "self-made" isn't directly advocating that the poor need only pull harder on their bootstraps, but it's only a few steps apart. If someone believes you can be "self-made" without also necessarily also having a substantial amount of luck, that someone can't explain the gap between success and mere subsistence as anything but "lack of determination", often with a moralistic tone. The very successful shape our society with their influence, which they wield in advancement of their beliefs. If those beliefs are incomplete, or lack empathy, it affects all of us.

dnautics 5y ago
the anti-"self-made" rhetoric is eventually going to backfire. There are plenty of people who are only modestly privileged, or even hugely privileged that had to pull through a ton of bullshit or work hundred hour weeks, oftentimes succeeding in spite of what they had to endure, that bristle at the connotation that because they happened to grow up with some amount of privilege, everything they did is unearned. Even if they were wrong and "they would have made it anyways" devaluing someone's effort like what I see happening these days (and moreover, socially pressured to shut up about it) is not a sustainable strategy for ameliorating social disparity.
- zelon88 5y ago
  Let's look at this scientifically. Being successful takes 100 units of energy. If one monkey starts with 0 units of energy and another monkey starts with 90 units of energy, how many units must each monkey spend to become "successful?" Now imagine the monkey who spent 10 units of energy sitting on Ellen's couch telling the world about how hard he pulled on those bootstraps. Edit: Fixed a typo.
  - dnautics 5y ago
    > "scientifically" I'm sorry. I am actually a former scientist, and I pulled hundred hour workweeks in the lab. You do not know what that word means. Moreover, you completely missed the point.
  - 5y ago

state_less 5y ago

That’s why we ought to give people a sense of the odds. The chance that you’ll be a $400k income earner is somewhere around 1 in 100, so not too likely. You can increase your odds by getting certain kinds of degrees and by living in certain areas, but odds are still going to be against you. I’m not sure how much since I don’t have the conditional probabilities at hand. Try to get your hands on the stats to set your expectations accordingly. Good luck out there!

username90 5y ago
The chance gets greatly increased if you are smart though. A smart person with a stem degree is would easily get a $400k salary by joining Google (they mostly test for intelligence so not hard to join for a smart person) and staying for 10 years. "Being born smart is luck" Depends on how you view it, we normally say luck are things that doesn't affect merit. "You were lucky to be born being able to do stuff others can't", well sure but that is how society should work, a person who provides more value should naturally get more of the rewards. Otherwise you'd have to say things like "Einstein discovered all the things he did almost solely thanks to luck!".
- state_less 5y ago
  Getting a STEM degree is a low probability event, say 1 in 10, then getting in google is another low probability event, say 1 in 10. So making it sound easy/likely seems misleading. I was acknowledging that there are things you can do to improve your odds. Einstein didn’t make it into the Google of his day. He worked as a patent clerk for some time while working on groundbreaking physics until he was accepted. It’s okay to be an average income earner, most are. Don’t get too hung up on something that isn’t likely for you. Also don’t forget what is valued can change. A farmer might be very lucky and valued, by a chance turn of events. If your doing well, be kind and try to raise the floor up for lesser income earners. Maybe they’ll remember you well if you have a turn of bad luck.
- lumost 5y ago
  Google tests for traditional Computer Science skills taught in a typical set of Algorithms classes at a 4 year degree program. A 400k/yr job at Google hired externally would typically be an individual with 10+ years of experience solving hard problems in production with exposure across organizational, engineering, management, and research domains. It's a fairly recent phenomena that Google began hiring from most universities at the college level, in 2010 they didn't even perform campus recruiting at all of the top-40 universities let alone dedicate valuable phone screen and interview time to candidates outside of top university programs with high GPAs. Hell this is the company founded by Stanford PHDs that famously required industry hires to furnish proof that they held a GPA higher than 3.5!