# If you're so smart, why ain't you rich? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 15, 2012, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568 "2012-08-15T14:41:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Lasciel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e79b87/32.png) [@Lasciel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lasciel)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2012, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/121 "2012-08-18T01:51:01Z")
I realized somewhere in college that people spend the vast majority of their lives at work. I also realized that every single type of work that I was familiar enough with to be hired into, passionate about doing, and had any type of aptitude for wouldn’t pay me enough to get rich. I would be ok, have enough to live on, be happy, but certainly not rich, and absolutely never enough to just bark off from work one day and travel the world or anything like that. And I decided that was ok. I haven’t seriously regretted my choice yet. I wouldn’t turn down a freak inheritance or a lotto win, but I’m doing ok. I like being happy at work. I like working short hours compared to ball-busters. I can think of many ways that I would like to spend lots of money, but if earning it meant that I spent longer at work away from my friends and family, and working at a place where I wasn’t as suited to the work, or didn’t enjoy it as much… I dunno - I don’t think it’s worth it to me just to have a bit more spending money, or a bigger house, or extra retirement money (although that last one would be actually useful). And I don’t think of my life/money status in terms of “lucky breaks” or being smarter or better than other people. I know I’m quite smart - I also know that doesn’t always have a lot to do with how wealthy a person is. (I like **Gyrate** ’s “wrong kind of smart” comment - that seems accurate for both me and my husband.) I also know that some people get lucky breaks and squander them, and some people make their own breaks and are better for the hardship that taught them to be creative or to persevere. ---
**Author:** ![Kaio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c68b51/32.png) [@Kaio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaio)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/122 "2012-08-19T15:32:04Z")
> [@Onomatopoeia](#): > > I don’t believe that anyone in America who truly works hard throughout their lives will get nowhere. Although I will stipulate that many people who work hard may not achieve the level of success and income they may desire, and may encounter roadblocks that impede their advancement, sometimes significantly, no one can ensure you get nowhere other than you. In that case you haven’t been paying attention, which is especially criminal these days when the recession, what caused it, and the widening income gap and virtual extinction of the American middle class – which has been going on for 30 years – is all up in the news and has been for years. > [@](#): > > I had no connections other than those I made myself. I’m one of those people who lived, breathed, and ate the possibilities of my future, not the banalities and petty desires of my present. There was no time for friends, no time for dates, no time for games. Although you possibly cannot concieve of it, I made my way to my success by the sweat of my own brow and my ambition, and not by the assistance of anyone other than parents, teachers, and professors. Perhaps these are the ‘connections’ to which you refer. Well, can’t argue with someone that deep in denial. You can make connections all ya want, but if none of the people you know, know the right people to introduce you to the right people to get you that right job, all your hard work is for naught. You can’t get a job if someone doesn’t give it to you. You can’t succeed on sheer force of will alone. Hell, Obama’s already given speeches to this effect. You don’t, can’t, succeed in a vacuum. I work my ass off. I’m good at what I do. I’m even fairly well-connected. I make less than $20K a year and have since the economy tanked, with a college degree, a decade of work experience, and even after going back to school. You haven’t lived my life either, and to assume that my lack of success is solely about how hard I work, and your success has absolutely nothing to do with luck and being in the right place at the right time, is naive, and that’s the nicest way I can put that. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/123 "2012-08-19T15:44:58Z")
There have been periods in my life where I was working hard, but came to realize the thing I was working hard at wasn’t something that brought as much value to others as I’d assumed. So I shifted gears and started working hard at something else. “Working hard” in and of itself doesn’t entitle me to diddly squat. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/124 "2012-08-19T15:47:36Z")
> [@Kaio](#): > > Just noting that the VAST majority of entertainers make _maybe_ a middle-class income, if that. This is true of all professions. The vast majority of people in every avenue of industry, service, and commerce of all types make, at best, a middle class income. Being rich is the exception in all pursuits. Logically, it must be the exception, since everyone in the thread is (mostly without noticing it) defining rich as being “substantially above the American median level of material wealth.” You can’t have most people above the median. ---
**Author:** ![thenonepercent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@thenonepercent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thenonepercent)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/125 "2012-08-19T15:55:40Z")
There are three paths to success in life: 1. Hard Work 2. Luck 3. Hard Work and Luck And only the latter two actually work. Hard Work without opportunity is wasted effort, and all it gets you is blisters, debt, and a sore back. You’ll have plenty of opportunities to see this in action as your fellow Baby Boomers age themselves into retirement, with nothing to show from years of hard work but a 10x10 room and pudding on Thursdays. Economic mobility is not a factor of effort; it’s a factor of the opportunities you’ve been given to turn your effort into useful action. Consider yourself fortunate indeed to have grown to a ripe old age without ever having to learn how the world actually works. ---
**Author:** ![Kaio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c68b51/32.png) [@Kaio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaio)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/126 "2012-08-19T16:10:42Z")
[Recent study on economic mobility](http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/12/1109153/-Pew-economic-mobility-study-paints-glass-half-full-half-empty-picture): > [@](#): > > What Pew found was that in the bottom and top quintiles, mobility is “sticky.” That is, if you were born into a family in the bottom 20 percent of the population, your chances of moving a rung or two higher was much less than if you were born into the next three quintiles. And if you were born into the top 20 percent, your chances of dropping by a rung or more was much less than if you were born into next lower quintiles. > [@](#): > > At all levels, Americans are likely to exceed their parents’ family incomes, but the extent of their income growth varies by quintile. Americans raised in the bottom who surpass their parents’ incomes do so by the smallest absolute amounts, while Americans raised in the top who surpass their parents’ incomes do so by the largest absolute amounts… > > If you grew up with parents who were broke, for example, having even a dollar to your name technically makes you richer than your folks. But you still don’t have any semblance of financial security. Likewise, given the growth at the very top of the wealth distribution, the rich children who are worth more than their rich parents are probably orders of magnitude richer than their parents. > [@](#): > > Wealth has decreased at the bottom and middle and has increased at the top two rungs of the ladder. The wealth compression is especially notable at the bottom: Median wealth for those in the lowest wealth quintile decreased from just under $7,500 in the parents’ generation to less than $2,800 in the children’s generation. I also read several articles not too long ago about a study which showed that America had less economic mobility than _Iran_. Hard work without opportunity means very little. ---
**Author:** ![Kaio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c68b51/32.png) [@Kaio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaio)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/127 "2012-08-19T16:24:14Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > There have been periods in my life where I was working hard, but came to realize the thing I was working hard at wasn’t something that brought as much value to others as I’d assumed. So I shifted gears and started working hard at something else. It’s very nice for you that your aptitudes and skills are that broad. (Jack of all trades, master of none? Somehow I doubt your career shift was as radical as you make it out to be.) Unfortunately, as mentioned above, I’m the “wrong” kind of smart. Even if I decided to switch, I’d make a lousy lawyer, say, and because of that I kinda doubt I’d be pulling in the big bucks anyway. People don’t spend lots of money on people who are bad at their jobs. Hell, people don’t HIRE people who are bad at their jobs. ---
**Author:** ![thenonepercent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@thenonepercent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thenonepercent)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/128 "2012-08-19T16:29:24Z")
The greatest lie the Republicans ever sold was that “you can be rich someday.” In most cases, this simply isn’t true, but the leaders of this country need that delusion to get the people to continue to elect people who will legislate against their best economic interests. Add to that the fact that most people tend to err upward when estimating how well off they are. Think you’re middle class? If you make less than $60k you’re lower middle class. Got a family? Good luck with that. ---
**Author:** ![thenonepercent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@thenonepercent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thenonepercent)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/129 "2012-08-19T16:37:55Z")
Upper Class: $500k+ Upper Middle: 100k+ Lower Middle Class: 35-70k Working Poor: 16k-30k Underclass: under 16k 45% of the population is middle-class compared to 60% in China and 60% in India. It isn’t because we have millions more rich people, but because income disparity is less. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/130 "2012-08-19T17:11:22Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > That…is why you fail.☹ That’s a little presumptuous, don’t you think? My goal isn’t to be “rich” anyway. I am, by **thenonepercent’s** numbers, upper middle class based on my wife and I’s income, and squarely middle class on my own income. I think maybe we’re talking around each other here. I’m not saying that people absolutely can’t be “rich” by working hard without any kind of outside assistance (nepotism, inherited wealth, connections, extreme luck, etc…), but that the numbers are against it in a way that they aren’t against someone making 75k and having a good professional job through hard work and grit. Like **RickJay** said, everyone can’t be above the median. I think there’s also a lack of recognition of luck going on, mostly because it doesn’t play into people’s internal perceptions of why they might be rich. It’s not sour grapes on my part- I’ve had some lucky breaks myself. But to claim that Mark Cuban or Mark Zuckerberg or any of the other absurdly rich people got where they are solely through hard work and grit is outlandish. They all had the stroke of luck to come up with a really great idea, or have an opportunity to sell their company at the top of an unrealistically inflated market, or any number of other things. That’s not to say that capitalizing on that luck doesn’t take hard work and grit- it absolutely does, but to say that anyone can be “rich” through hard work and grit is stupid- it doesn’t work that way. If it did, then all those Mexican yard-mowers and all the other people who bust their asses, save their money and do everything “right” and yet end up making an average or worse wage, would all be super rich. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/131 "2012-08-19T17:42:40Z")
Because the things I really like to do and am good at don’t pay. But I made the choice to do these things in the presence of more lucrative alternatives. I’m pretty upper-middle class by national standards and own an apartment in Manhattan. I don’t eat at Le Parker Meridien or anything, but we don’t think much about money and just put $10k into redoing our bathroom. I’m certainly not rich by local standards. I think this is more or less my choice. I made a decision to leave my junior management job at a big financial services company because I wanted to get my PhD in something arcane and not at all businesslike. I really didn’t want to be like the people I was working for, so instead of taking another promotion, I quit. Three months before I got sent to Hawaii as part of a rewards & recognition junket to honor the top 1% performing employees. I had plenty of executive sponsorship. Now I read books all day and teach. I supplement my income doing analytics work for the people I used to work with. Most of this work is actually quite interesting, but best of all, there are no meetings, no people management, no performance review, no decks, no sales, no bullshit. I do work for which I am paid adequately. Maybe I would have succeeded in the corporate race to the middle; maybe not. Rejecting the chance for wealth is not the same as doing something else with your life even if wealth is handed to you. I have family for that. My family is rich and well-connected. It has departments at major universities that bear its name. The family business my grandfather built is a cash cow and is competently run by my uncle. I grew up with every advantage. I was born on second base and have enough intelligence at least to stay there. So I’m not rich because I didn’t join the family business and set out to do my own thing instead. I work ferociously hard. I am a student in a demanding, elite program for which I am fully funded. My life is studying, working, and trying to help my wife with our 2-year old. Things would have been a lot easier if I were a VP at my old company or just worked for my uncle. But I have perverse values and like to do things the hard way, so that’s why I am not rich. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/132 "2012-08-19T17:44:19Z")
> [@bump](#): > > That’s a little presumptuous, don’t you think? Yoda whoosh. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/133 "2012-08-19T17:51:20Z")
Answer “Other”: What does the one have to do with the other? Because it really is a stupid question, usually meant to dismiss offhand the opinion of the person being questioned. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/134 "2012-08-19T21:25:40Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > This is true of all professions. The vast majority of people in every avenue of industry, service, and commerce of all types make, at best, a middle class income. Being rich is the exception in all pursuits. Logically, it must be the exception, since everyone in the thread is (mostly without noticing it) defining rich as being “substantially above the American median level of material wealth.” You can’t have most people above the median. I think a better way of putting it is that entertainers are in what is sometimes called a “glamour” profession where the vast majority don’t make a living at all, or just barely, and a few people become fabulously rich. Other similar professions are novelists and professional sports players. The point is that not only is being rich the exception in these professions, being able to support oneself is as well. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/135 "2012-08-19T22:18:55Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > Just curious - what _do_ you do? Keep it vague if you have to. Video game development. It’s not really what a lot of people think- I don’t get to play games all day. It has its annoyances and overtime… but whenever I start complaining, I try to remember what it was like delivering pizza for a living. ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2012, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/136 "2012-08-19T22:47:16Z")
I’m smart about things other than money. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2012, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/137 "2012-08-20T00:06:00Z")
> [@bump](#): > > That’s a little presumptuous, don’t you think? My goal isn’t to be “rich” anyway. So a combination of not believing it’s possible and not even trying?🙂 The reality is, the higher the income level, the increasingly more difficult it is to earn that income. Certainly luck, timing and circumstances play into it. You also can’t control what skills you were born with or the environment that you were born into. But it’s not completely random either. Smart, talented, passionate people tend to find their own opportunities. They may not all end up billionares (as there are only 1200 on the planet), but they tend to do ok). Now the reason I’m not “rich” is that I chose a path to riches that is highly competetive. Every year consulting firms hire entire classes of guys just like me right out of all the top MBA programs. At every year, 20% or so leave or are forced out. So statistically speaking, it is very difficult to last the 12-15 or so years it takes to make “partner” in one of those career tracks. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2012, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/138 "2012-08-20T00:40:31Z")
> [@thenonepercent](#): > > Upper Class: $500k+ > Upper Middle: 100k+ > Lower Middle Class: 35-70k > Working Poor: 16k-30k > Underclass: under 16k > > 45% of the population is middle-class compared to 60% in China and 60% in India. It isn’t because we have millions more rich people, but because income disparity is less. Or maybe because India and China has a lower average income genius. ---
**Author:** ![Simple\_Linctus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Simple\_Linctus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simple_Linctus)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2012, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/139 "2012-08-20T00:57:12Z")
Why is there no “I plan to be rich” option? I’m 25 and assuming no horrid unexpected incidents, I fully plan to be rich aged 40 and probably will be. Another track of life i’d have been rich now but I had to turn to illicit substances in a world where those who get them are persecuted. But I’m fine. I have roughly $50k, maybe $75k in the bank. Thats’ not too bad for a 25 year old I think. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2012, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568/140 "2012-08-21T21:41:11Z")
> [@bump](#): > > I don’t think it’s possible to work your way up into “rich”-ness without having some combination of luck, nepotism, family wealth or connections. A lot of my schoolmates had poorer parents than I did, and fewer connections, yet ended up much weathier than I am. They developed their social skills, and made their own connections. The human connections are important. Every time I have gotten a job based on my résumé, the job has sucked. Every good job I have had, I got because someone in the company knew me, and said good things about me to the guy doing the hiring. Luck exists, but it affects everybody. Millionaires’ children die in car wrecks, just like paupers’ children. In the long run, it tends to level the playing field. Professional gamblers don’t rely on luck. They calculate the odds, plan for all possible outcomes, and have the discipline to stick with the plan. As for the OP: in the words of Robert Heinlein, “You and I will never be rich. We will work just hard enough to support our vices.” Unfortunately, my favorite vices are fairly cheap. I was a bright kid in school. When I entered college, I majored in engineering. As it turned out, mathematics bored me. So I didn’t do the homework. So I flunked the math courses. I ended up with a liberal arts degree, and graduated during a recession. (Of course, millions of other people graduated during that same recession, but most of them ended up richer than me.) I don’t blame Bush Sr. for making me poor, and I don’t blame Clinton for failing to make me rich. I have had lucky breaks, and unlucky breaks, but overall, I am where I am because of choices that I made. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-youre-so-smart-why-aint-you-rich/631568.md?page=8)