If you’ve read my other posts, you’ll know that I try very hard not to offend people, especially people I disagree with. I value dialogue and respect between interlocutors. Having said that, I came across this meme recently:
The moment I saw this, one word popped into my head and it stuck there as I tried to find a more balanced response:
Duh!
This meme is a classic example of the logical fallacy known as “straw man.” You probably already know what a straw man is, but basically, it’s when you are in an argument and, in order to score points, you pretend that your opponent is the stupidest human being on the face of the earth so you can say something incredibly simple and self-evident and pretend that it has anything to do with what your opponent was trying to say.
The problem with arguments is that your opponent probably did say something incredibly stupid like “it seems like no one wants to work these days” and absolutely deserved the straw man.
So let’s lower the temperature a bit and have a nuanced discussion about hard work and wealth.
Hard work does not lead inexorably to wealth. True. Self evidently true.
However wealth cannot be generated without hard work. Notice I very carefully did not say that you cannot become wealthy without hard work, because there is such thing as inheritance.
To generate wealth, you need hard work and intelligence and risk and luck. It cannot be done without all four. Even if you’re intelligent, take calculated risks, and get extremely lucky, you won’t generate wealth without hard work. That’s why people bring it up.
Many successful people assume that what holds people back is unwillingness to work hard. I disagree. Everyone is willing to work hard if they need to. Almost everyone would be willing to work hard if it had perfect correlation with generating wealth.
In my opinion, what holds most people back is unwillingness to take risks. Because taking risks is dangerous. Most small businesses fail. Most crazy investments lose money. That’s why it’s called “risk.” But the modern world is pretty good at protecting everyone from death and starvation if you risk it all and lose. And the thing about risk is that the more you do it, the more you stand to gain if you get lucky.
You get to decide which risks you take. But once you take the risk, luck has a huge say over whether you win or lose. Most successful people lose a lot, then keep risking. The more you lose, the more you learn. The more you learn, the better your chances of getting lucky next time. But luck will always have a say.
Then again, so will hard work.
