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The probability in GP's comment assumes that everyone has an equal chance of attaining billionaire status, and that the percentage of billionaires in the world
by NietzscheanNull 2y ago
The probability in GP's comment assumes that everyone has an equal chance of attaining billionaire status, and that the percentage of billionaires in the world remains constant. Given heritability of wealth and access to better education and healthcare, wealthy children have much lower barriers to success. The second assumption may not hold either, as the current overall economic trends seem to favor increasing concentration of wealth.
It'd be interesting to see just how steeply those advantages decrease the odds for the rest of us. I'd be willing to bet that—even in a comparatively wealthy developed country—the true chances for an average person achieving >$1B are orders of magnitude lower than the figure quoted.
- PaulHoule 2y agoI feel like the odds are so long that a few orders of magnitude either way don't really change the argument that luck is a bigger factory than anything else. Developing vs developing world is an interesting question. There are a lot of people in the developing world who outright stole $1B or more, and the process of development frequently makes billionaires. Chinese people I know who came to the US and had average results often regret coming because they know people back home who got really lucky and hit it big.
- locallost 2y agoI agree, it's not at all perfectly random. For some the chances are better than 1 in 3 million, for others they are miniscule and improbable.