>Tell that to the kid making iPhones in the Foxconn facility.
I'm not even sure what your point is. GP was pointing out that competition at every level is fierce. Not sure what that has to do with the Foxconn employee. Are they known for not being competitive?
If you're one of the Rich Kids of Instagram, hard work doesn't seem to play much of a role in their lives.
The point about Foxconn is obvious. How many Foxconn employees have a realistic chance of topping the rich list?
Hard work, like the idea of being a self-made person, is largely a self-serving mythology.
Real hard work is doing the same shitty job for 10-12 hours a day six or seven days a week and earning barely enough to pay the rent.
That's the reality of hard work for much of the population. Fetishising the hard work of the already-rich discounts that ground truth.
Great point.
There is a good historical example you can see this in the of the current BBC adaption of Winston Grahams series, Poldark. [0] Contrasting aristocratic families surviving by Name (old money and scheming) or by Wit (entrepreneurial graft and hard work) in the 18th century UK, Cornwall.
[0] BFI Q&A with writer Debbie Horsfield and director Ed Bazalgette discussing adaption and research. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsCKYX9-ntw
The kid in the Foxconn facility is better off if he works there than if he did not have any job. If it were otherwise he would quit the job (since the kid is a poor worker, but not a slave). So indeed having a job at Foxconn lead to a better (though still bad) life for the kid. The kid should rather complain at his parents that they, as poor people, gave life to him - they should know that because of their poverty he would lead a miserable life and hazarded the consequences.
Tell that to the kid making iPhones in the Foxconn facility. Success isn't where you are, it's how far you've come. By that metric the most successful thing you can do in life is have a father like Sam Walton.