
How To Make Wealth (2004) - alifaziz
http://www.paulgraham.com/wealth.html
======
dkokelley
A request to HN users: do not upvote based on the article source alone,
especially if you have already seen this. This article is 6 years old, and I
would be surprised to discover that a significant number of HNers have not yet
read the essay (which is excellent by the way, if you really haven't read it
yet).

If enough new users found upvote-worthy value from the article being submitted
this time, then that's great, and the front page ranking is well-deserved. My
concern is that given the age of the article, it will remain on the front page
despite most users having already read it years ago, without the community
really gaining any new value from it.

~~~
alifaziz
Written to read and reread. What's wrong with that. After 6 years our mind
might already loaded and bloated with many things.

That's why the 'refresh' button is there.

~~~
smackay
I can see real value in re-submitting this if there are a series of
submissions or comments that shows this is a current topic of interest but it
would be a shame if HN became more like TV with endless repeats.

Having said that I think classic Paul Graham essays such as The Submarine
should be re-read at least once per year and perhaps more often than that.

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newt
I stopped after the first paragraph: _If you wanted to get rich, how would you
do it? I think your best bet would be to start or join a startup. That's been
a reliable way to get rich for hundreds of years._

Come on. Startups are long shots, a gamble, definitely not a reliable bet.
Most startups fail ( <http://hubpages.com/hub/why-startups-fail> ) and very
few are massive successes. It's the rock-star model of getting rich - many
try, few succeed.

Was a "venture-backed trading voyages of the Middle Ages" a "reliable way to
get rich" ? There were pirates, the danger of sinking the ship in storms or on
rocks, scurvy, unpredictable conditions at the other end of the voyage etc...
basically it's high risk, high reward.

~~~
codeslush
Perhaps it would be a good idea to read the entire essay before passing
judgement. Indeed, you'll find your point is addressed in the very essay you
stopped reading.

~~~
newt
Contradicting yourself is not the same as addressing a point.

~~~
chc
Stopping after one paragraph is not the same thing as reading an essay
thoroughly enough to form anything but superficial criticism.

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spacemanaki
I just finished reading the all of _Hackers and Painters_ after getting a
cheap ebook from O Reilly. I wondered if there is any criticism of some of the
economic theory ones? Specifically the one that follows this one in the book,
_Mind the Gap_. (It says essentially that economic disparity isn't necessarily
bad for society)

I don't have the background in economics or history to know if his examples
are sound or not, but the part of me that tends towards more liberal values
finds some of the arguments a bit repellent. Somehow, it seems to me that
using the fact that "in ancient Rome the price of slaves varied by a factor of
50 depending on their skills" to help justify CEOs and baseball players high
salaries is probably inherently flawed.

While reading it on the subway on my Android phone in epub format, the
footnotes were broken, but I had hoped that the footnote attached this tidbit
was some qualifying statement about why slavery isn't necessarily the best
model to use when thinking about the worth of people today, but I was
disappointed to find that the note was just more details on the economics of
slavery and a reference, and seems to miss completely how flawed that line of
thinking might be.

Is there anyone who is more economically educated who knows of some criticism
of these essays? I know this probably sounds like someone who has had their
beliefs questioned and wants to re-affirm them, and of course that's part of
it. But I also remember reading the blog post "Dabblers and Blowhards" which
picked apart PG's ideas about painting based on some (possibly) mistaken ideas
about that history... so I'm suspicious.

Ultimately I would like to learn more about economic theory like this, so I'm
looking for "criticism" in the sense of thoughtful discussions and response,
not necessarily outright disagreement.

And thanks!

~~~
randallsquared
It seems like you're looking for _ethical_ criticism of _Mind the Gap_ , not
economic criticism. I thought it was clear that the prices were just how much
Romans were willing to pay for the services of people of varying levels of
ability, and that the detail of who was receiving payment was not really part
of the argument, although it apparently distracted from the argument itself in
this case.

~~~
spacemanaki
Thanks, I think you're partly right, re-writing the analogy that way does make
it seem more reasonable to me. (I still think it's a bad analogy) But there
were other parts of the essay I wondered about... the "Daddy model of wealth",
the historical time periods and "whether you could accumulate a fortune by
creating wealth has been turned on and off" ... These are ideas (like PG's
about oil painting being like Lisp hacking) I just do not feel qualified to
judge - they are interesting, for sure, but I can't know if they are accurate
or reasonable. So I hoped someone else could point me in the right direction.

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gatsby
The line, "Money is a side effect of specialization" reminded me of one of my
favorite Gary Vaynerchuk lines: "Do the single thing that you know best. Bring
it to the lowest level. The sweet spot. It doesn't have to be music, doesn't
have to be hip-hop, doesn't have to be P. Diddy. It can be P. Diddy's hair."

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brc
It's a good article, but the second old pg essay we've seen today. Is this
some type of strategy to gain points by re-submitting old pg essays?

For the record, this is my favourite and I quote from it all the time, much to
others annoyance.

~~~
ztan
I'm a new user. I too have just discovered today that quoting pg does seem to
make some people here uncomfortable. However even they admit themselves that
those are words we quote are of wisdom.

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mindcrime
_I would be surprised to discover that a significant number of HNers have not
yet read the essay_

I don't know... it'd be interesting to know how frequently new users sign up,
and what the average "age" of the accounts are, who regularly read/post.
Personally, I suspect there are quite a few newer users who might not have
read that (or any other given) pg article; but I can't prove it. Heck, I've
been around for a while now and I doubt I've read all of pg's articles.

~~~
mise
Yup, there's always new people. The "collective knowledge" of the crowd
doesn't instantly permeate to new or infrequent visitors.

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tomjen3
You can make wealth, but lets be realistic it is often easier to steal it (not
with guns, but with things like patents, lobbyism, etc), so why make it?

~~~
noonespecial
If you don't already know, I think it would be very difficult to tell you.

------
daniel-cussen
[2004]

~~~
angrycoder
Is this the new HN equivalent of 'first'?

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thailandstartup
I've read it before too - but thanks for the re-submission anyway. I hadn't
realized the strength of the title before. 'Making Wealth' is a great phrase
to evoke and question the idea of 'Making Money'.

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nicksergeant
I think he nailed it for the most part. Anytime you hear a person of 'wealth'
talk about becoming financially successful, they too define it as 'wealth' and
not 'money'.

That's probably where the line is drawn between those who have a lot of
'money' and those who don't.

