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The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Tell me about becoming wealthy
 
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Ham Equity
Apr 16, 2013

i hosted a great goon meet and all i got was this lousy avatar
Grimey Drawer
If you haven't been born into wealth, the first step is to be lucky. Frequently, very lucky.

Everyone telling you to study successful people is ignoring a substantial problem: successful people frequently don't know what the gently caress they're talking about. Did you know that all wealthy, successful people breathe, eat, and drink? So, clearly what you need to do to be successful is breathe, eat, and drink!

The problem with studying successful people is they don't loving know why they succeeded. They did a bunch of poo poo; of that huge selection of poo poo they did, the things they write and talk about are the things they've chosen to believe made them successful. Did those things actually make them successful, did they have nothing to do with their success, or did they succeed in spite of those things? They sure as gently caress don't know.

Most people who become wealthy at some point take a risk that pays off. But tons of people take those kinds of risks and fail, but nobody ever really writes or talks about them.

There are poo poo-tons of articles that talk about the problem of focusing only on successes, and lots of people have been writing about it for well over a decade, now, so I'm really surprised to see a bunch of people spouting a bunch of the sort of inspirational pornography that the self-help industry uses to sucker people into buying books and programs in this thread.

EDIT: Since everyone else is giving you recommended reading materials:

Michael Lewis' Liar's Poker, about his experiences working for Salomon Brothers doing bond trading in the 80s.

Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers: The Story of Success, which is probably the easiest of the three to read, but also the least rigorous.

Robert H. Frank's Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy

Ham Equity fucked around with this message at 19:33 on Dec 3, 2016

* # ¿ Dec 3, 2016 19:24
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# ¿ May 2, 2024 03:16
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Ham Equity
Apr 16, 2013

i hosted a great goon meet and all i got was this lousy avatar
Grimey Drawer

MrMidnight posted:

Its really quite simple!

1. Don't get married
2. Don't have kids

For the average goon it shouldn't be hard to achieve these 2 steps.
You'll make a ton more money by being married, as long as you don't have kids. Housing, food, maintenance, insurance, transportation, etc. for two people together is waaaaaaaaaayyyyyyy less than twice as expensive as it is for one person alone.

Just don't spend a shitload on the wedding.

* # ¿ Jan 15, 2017 20:49
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The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Tell me about becoming wealthy