6 ms·

I don't know why this is getting downvoted. Yes, inequality exists and it sucks, but you still need to make the best out of what you have. Also, a lot of peopl

I don't know why this is getting downvoted. Yes, inequality exists and it sucks, but you still need to make the best out of what you have. Also, a lot of people seem to far overestimate the work and risk involved. This doesn't help really poor people, obviously, but the amount of people with sufficient money, backing and time that complained they'd start a company if they "only also had $20 million backing from their parents" is staggering.

bombcar 4y ago
People don't want to admit it involves hard work and luck - they'd rather think that Bill Gates got to where he is because of his parents (even though there are thousands/millions with similar parents and backgrounds who didn't get even close). Because one line of thought leads to: "I couldn't do anything, the game was rigged from the start" and the other leads to "I didn't do as much as I could have done."
- Swizec 4y ago
  > People don't want to admit it involves hard work and luck My favorite realization from actually playing cards. We used to play a lot of rummy on vacations as a family. Like a lot. I kept losing. Hard. Absolutely destroyed. If only I could get this one card to complete my hand, I’d win every time. But it just wouldn’t come! I had terrible luck. Someone else always ended up winning before I got the one card I needed to make the high score and beat everyone else into submission. It was infuriating. After a while I changed tactics. No waiting. Make a play on every play. Something, anything, with whatever cards you’ve got. Find a way to make the card you just picked up work. Suddenly I was winning almost every game. Everyone complained how much it sucks to play cards with me. How does this kid always get exactly the perfect card!? Now I’m banned from playing cards with family. Last time I played rummy was with my girlfriend’s family over Christmas a few years ago. They banned me immediately. Cards never come up again in conversation lol. It really isn’t about the cards. They’re just the ingredient.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    This is really visible in bridge; the hands are all random but how you play them is entirely skill. Anyone can win with a perfect hand; the skill comes in dealing with the imperfect hands. True in life, too. Bridge is nice that you can compensate for skill somewhat by handicapping, and the less-skilled players can still get a great hand and win sometimes. I always say "bridge is a fun game to lose" - and that's a really important part of a game you want to play.
    - mcguire 4y ago
      Bridge is a weird game in that the actual play of the hand is almost unimportant. You can lose the game by playing the hand badly, but you can only win consistently in the bidding. Which is why abstract and complicated bidding systems dominate the game, which gives it that lovely, steep initial learning curve.
  - vangelis 4y ago
    now imagine each bad play had a cost and you had a budget before too many knocked you out of the game
    - Swizec 4y ago
      now imagine doing nothing had a cost and you decided to sit there and pout because others have better cards
      - mcguire 4y ago
        This is really not a helpful reply. To make rummy a good metaphor for this discussion, you need to modify the normal $1/point rummy gambling rules; say making gin gives you $1000 bonus from the house or something. (There's a resemblance to quiddich here, I think.) Anyway, now you have the two extreme strategies: knock if you can, which gets you a few dollars each time, or try exclusively for gin, which usually costs you money on each hand but sometimes pays off. If you're skint, the gin strategy won't work since you can't stay in the game long enough. If you're flush, the knock strategy is uninteresting because a few dollars doesn't make a difference. Now make that bonus $10,000,000,000 and you're making some unicorns, Harry!
- danaris 4y ago
  But the true answer lies between the two. The game is rigged. But that merely makes it less likely that someone who's on the wrong side can succeed, not impossible. You do have to do as much as you can, with what you're given, regardless of what it is. The real key, though, is that this tells us what we, as a society, need to change. If we genuinely value entrepreneurship and innovation, we need to create a universal safety net that lets people take risks, try things, and fail, again and again, without ending up destitute, because we know that is what leads to eventually creating a successful business.
  - bumby 4y ago
    Isn’t this what limited liability corporations help ensure? People need a way to limit downsides, not have zero downside. It’s like giving a student a service chance at a test to help ensure they learn the material. But giving them unlimited attempts with no risk doesn’t create the same environment.
    - danaris 4y ago
      LLCs let you avoid having personal liability for accidents, corporate malfeasance, etc. They don't let you avoid having to invest your own money into the company to try to make it go, because no one else cares enough about your idea to do so, then lose it all if it fails. Having something like universal basic income absolutely does not reduce the risk to zero. What it does is it reduces the penalty for failure—failure which is often largely out of your hands. Rather than such failures meaning you lose your life savings, have no job, and are months/weeks/days from homelessness, they would mean you are making only the minimum needed to sustain housing, food, and clothing. For most people, particularly those of the type to try starting their own business, that still won't be enough to be happy. The threat of death by exposure and starvation should not be what drives us to do better. We, as a society, should have moved past that already.
      - bumby 4y ago
        LLCs do provide limitations towards losing your life savings or home. They create a buffer between personal and corporate assets. I think a key difference is the benefits are targeted towards those who are trying to create value, whereas UBI is much less targeted. At least from an economic sense, LLCs seem like a much more efficient mechanism.

bombcar 4y ago

People don't want to admit it involves hard work and luck - they'd rather think that Bill Gates got to where he is because of his parents (even though there are thousands/millions with similar parents and backgrounds who didn't get even close). Because one line of thought leads to: "I couldn't do anything, the game was rigged from the start" and the other leads to "I didn't do as much as I could have done."

Swizec 4y ago
> People don't want to admit it involves hard work and luck My favorite realization from actually playing cards. We used to play a lot of rummy on vacations as a family. Like a lot. I kept losing. Hard. Absolutely destroyed. If only I could get this one card to complete my hand, I’d win every time. But it just wouldn’t come! I had terrible luck. Someone else always ended up winning before I got the one card I needed to make the high score and beat everyone else into submission. It was infuriating. After a while I changed tactics. No waiting. Make a play on every play. Something, anything, with whatever cards you’ve got. Find a way to make the card you just picked up work. Suddenly I was winning almost every game. Everyone complained how much it sucks to play cards with me. How does this kid always get exactly the perfect card!? Now I’m banned from playing cards with family. Last time I played rummy was with my girlfriend’s family over Christmas a few years ago. They banned me immediately. Cards never come up again in conversation lol. It really isn’t about the cards. They’re just the ingredient.
- bombcar 4y ago
  This is really visible in bridge; the hands are all random but how you play them is entirely skill. Anyone can win with a perfect hand; the skill comes in dealing with the imperfect hands. True in life, too. Bridge is nice that you can compensate for skill somewhat by handicapping, and the less-skilled players can still get a great hand and win sometimes. I always say "bridge is a fun game to lose" - and that's a really important part of a game you want to play.
  - mcguire 4y ago
    Bridge is a weird game in that the actual play of the hand is almost unimportant. You can lose the game by playing the hand badly, but you can only win consistently in the bidding. Which is why abstract and complicated bidding systems dominate the game, which gives it that lovely, steep initial learning curve.
- vangelis 4y ago
  now imagine each bad play had a cost and you had a budget before too many knocked you out of the game
  - Swizec 4y ago
    now imagine doing nothing had a cost and you decided to sit there and pout because others have better cards
    - mcguire 4y ago
      This is really not a helpful reply. To make rummy a good metaphor for this discussion, you need to modify the normal $1/point rummy gambling rules; say making gin gives you $1000 bonus from the house or something. (There's a resemblance to quiddich here, I think.) Anyway, now you have the two extreme strategies: knock if you can, which gets you a few dollars each time, or try exclusively for gin, which usually costs you money on each hand but sometimes pays off. If you're skint, the gin strategy won't work since you can't stay in the game long enough. If you're flush, the knock strategy is uninteresting because a few dollars doesn't make a difference. Now make that bonus $10,000,000,000 and you're making some unicorns, Harry!
danaris 4y ago
But the true answer lies between the two. The game is rigged. But that merely makes it less likely that someone who's on the wrong side can succeed, not impossible. You do have to do as much as you can, with what you're given, regardless of what it is. The real key, though, is that this tells us what we, as a society, need to change. If we genuinely value entrepreneurship and innovation, we need to create a universal safety net that lets people take risks, try things, and fail, again and again, without ending up destitute, because we know that is what leads to eventually creating a successful business.
- bumby 4y ago
  Isn’t this what limited liability corporations help ensure? People need a way to limit downsides, not have zero downside. It’s like giving a student a service chance at a test to help ensure they learn the material. But giving them unlimited attempts with no risk doesn’t create the same environment.
  - danaris 4y ago
    LLCs let you avoid having personal liability for accidents, corporate malfeasance, etc. They don't let you avoid having to invest your own money into the company to try to make it go, because no one else cares enough about your idea to do so, then lose it all if it fails. Having something like universal basic income absolutely does not reduce the risk to zero. What it does is it reduces the penalty for failure—failure which is often largely out of your hands. Rather than such failures meaning you lose your life savings, have no job, and are months/weeks/days from homelessness, they would mean you are making only the minimum needed to sustain housing, food, and clothing. For most people, particularly those of the type to try starting their own business, that still won't be enough to be happy. The threat of death by exposure and starvation should not be what drives us to do better. We, as a society, should have moved past that already.
    - bumby 4y ago
      LLCs do provide limitations towards losing your life savings or home. They create a buffer between personal and corporate assets. I think a key difference is the benefits are targeted towards those who are trying to create value, whereas UBI is much less targeted. At least from an economic sense, LLCs seem like a much more efficient mechanism.