- 02 Mar 2009 23:13
#1821106
You assume that luck only comes into play at birth. However, rich people are usually lucky there whole life because, lets face it, even a tiny unlikely accident at some point could have forced you into poverty. (Getting sick early in your career without proper health insurance anyone?) And many opportunitites came to them for exactly the same reason, pure luck. There are many more superhard-working people out there than super-rich people.... Chance is determining our life to a much larger extent than just setting the starting conditions. On the other hand, even if you are supersmart and hardworking (note that this is also to a large extent determined by genetic luck but let's ignore that for a second), if born in some African country to a family of peasants you will in all likelihood end up as one too.
Ford was lucky enough to meet the right people at the right time offering the right opportunites. Of course he contributed to that by being inventive and working hard but that alone did not make him successful.
Entirely, yes. But the amount of real agency left after subtracting genetics and luck in life is probably not enough to justify not paying taxes. If we assume that something like free will really exists, that is.
Ama wrote:The trouble with this "it's all luck" argument is that you assume everyone born into identical conditions ends up in an identical situation. But some people are born poor and end up rich. Or, more often, people are born poor and end up somewhat comfortably middle-class, like me. The circumstances of one's birth can't be the only deciding factor, especially in the broad first-world vs. third-world sense that you mention, or everyone "lucky enough" to be born in a first-world country would be equally rich.
You assume that luck only comes into play at birth. However, rich people are usually lucky there whole life because, lets face it, even a tiny unlikely accident at some point could have forced you into poverty. (Getting sick early in your career without proper health insurance anyone?) And many opportunitites came to them for exactly the same reason, pure luck. There are many more superhard-working people out there than super-rich people.... Chance is determining our life to a much larger extent than just setting the starting conditions. On the other hand, even if you are supersmart and hardworking (note that this is also to a large extent determined by genetic luck but let's ignore that for a second), if born in some African country to a family of peasants you will in all likelihood end up as one too.
Ama wrote:Was it just luck that Henry Ford was able to produce inexpensive automobiles by using innovative assembly line techniques?
Ford was lucky enough to meet the right people at the right time offering the right opportunites. Of course he contributed to that by being inventive and working hard but that alone did not make him successful.
Ama wrote:To declare that a person's wealth is based entirely on luck is ridiculous and naive.
Entirely, yes. But the amount of real agency left after subtracting genetics and luck in life is probably not enough to justify not paying taxes. If we assume that something like free will really exists, that is.