It would make for a interesting study, but the example that I heard in one lecture on multi social groups was a janitor (low rank work position) gaining health benefits from being the leader of a chess club. I view it as completely plausible that Internet social points to be very similar to that of chess club social points.

That said, perception can quickly change and it very possible that the distance that Internet has makes it more vulnerable to collapsing. In an other lecture on stress it was pointed out that few things cause more harm than when false hope is found to be misplaced, so it very possible that if a individual perceive themselves as high ranked only to be proven wrong, then that can cause major health related issues. It was something that stress studies found out the hard way.

The op was referring to perceived status for example I used to work at a former "proper" civil service telecoms company in the UK.

Because of the inherited status of M&P grades most of us where quite happy to take our toil - though this depended on your family's status as well.

No, GP was specifically talking about HN karma https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18643427.