Comments on: A Friendly Chat With a Rich Person

By: Leslie

Leslie — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 14:24:23 +0000

One of the things that bothers me about this article (and often about this site in general) is how often they talk about rich people being “lucky.” I understand that there are some people out there who got their wealth by chance, but this guy doesn’t seem to be one of them.
“I put a ton of work into figuring out how to make a career out of what I liked.”
“I went to a small state school nobody’s heard of, who paid me to keep my GPA over 3.25,”
“I did about six years of school work in four years.”

This guy obviously worked HARD. He wasn’t just dicking around all of his twenties and then stumbled into a pile of cash.
The thought that we can only obtain wealth through “luck” is a very self-destructive way of thinking, and I hate how The Billfold spreads that idea. It may relieve you of feeling responsible for your poor financial situation, but also takes away any control for you to turn it around.

If you think that luck is the only way people get rich, you are never going to get there yourself.

By: Shanomalous@twitter

Shanomalous@twitter — Sat, 09 Feb 2013 21:27:34 +0000

@jenfizz I want to buy you a $2 PBR. :)

By: Shanomalous@twitter

Shanomalous@twitter — Sat, 09 Feb 2013 21:25:37 +0000

@lizard Seriously, guys? He makes more than 89% of Americans (if the NYT is accurate), and you don’t consider that rich?

By: jenfizz

jenfizz — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 18:30:39 +0000

@JenH This sort of thinking just makes me want to slam my head in a car door. You make more than 85% of Americans and 99.9% of people in the world. That makes you rich. Rich does not mean never having to think about money.

By: EggsErroneous

EggsErroneous — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 18:09:43 +0000

@josefinastrummer I read this article earlier this morning and was thinking RP sure uses a lot of exclamation points, I wonder if during the interview Logan was picking up on him being a really happy or excited person, open to talking about his life. And now I’m reading the comments here thinking wow I shouldn’t remark on how exclamation point happy RP or the writer is because daaaaaang observation/criticism line so fine here and successfully conveying tone or earnestness in internet comments not my forte.

By: lizard

lizard — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 18:00:19 +0000

@aetataureate vocal fry is just an annoying thing that some women do. why does it have to be some huge sexist deal to say its annoying? its like a valley girl voice.

By: lizard

lizard — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 17:58:10 +0000

@This_Rich_Person yea i do actually. i dont consider you rich, sorry. you are comfortable but not rich to me.

By: This_Rich_Person

This_Rich_Person — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 16:48:31 +0000

@JenH I hear you, but DC is the same cost of living as LA. I think part of the problem, as I mentioned up top just now, is that debt is not considered when talking about income. We should probably be talking about debt as part of conversations about income. (I’d love to see how the “you make more with a bachelor degree” data works with average student loan debt, for instance.)

By: This_Rich_Person

This_Rich_Person — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 16:45:31 +0000

@poptastic This is definitely true. My broad plan has always been “make as much money as early as possible, then figure out what to do next,” so if the bottom falls out of my career I’ve got a few backup ideas, slash I can always turn into a househusband.

@lizard, everyone else: Do you all really think that “rich” means “top .5% of income for your city”? That’s kind of extreme! I’d also point out that I can save this well because I have no debt, which doesn’t usually get factored into conversations about income. All of the “median income” numbers should also imply “median debt held.”

By: Slutface

Slutface — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 16:44:23 +0000

@aetataureate This is the first I’ve heard of sexism being involved with vocal fry, so yes, I guess I do need to do some reading. But there wasn’t any sexism in my comment at all. I’m really put off that Mallory attacked me like this for no reason so I’m just going to stop reading and commenting on this site period because it’s not the first time she’s done this to me. If she would’ve explained vocal fry and sexism instead of attacking me, I would feel differently. But like I said, this isn’t the first time she has done this and I’ve seen it happen to others. I don’t read and comment here to be attacked. I didn’t realize this was Gawker.