

What busy professionals and the working poor have in common - chrisyeh
http://chrisyeh.blogspot.com/2013/07/what-busy-professionals-and-working.html

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rayiner
My wife's step-dad is a surgeon, and an excellent one. Very methodical and
careful, as you'd expect a surgeon to be. But his home life is often quite
chaotic. E.g. instead of paying his electric bill on time, he just writes a
big check every six months and hopes it works out. The lack of mental
bandwidth is definitely a real phenomenon.

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da02
Do you have any more anecdotes like this? From him or from other people?

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rayiner
I personally find all the decisions I have to make outside of work exhausting.
I _loved_ having a cafeteria at work because I had like a handful of lunch
choices instead of the frankly crippling array of choices available in midtown
manhattan.

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jmduke
_Most busy professionals view the working poor who struggle from paycheck to
paycheck with barely veiled contempt. These holier-than-thou Whole Foods
shoppers marvel at the poor decisions of the poor, whether in consumption of
fast food, using payday loans, or worst of all, buying lottery tickets._

Er, is this a Silicon Valley thing?

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seanwoods
I blame the companies providing these services more than the consumers who
sign up for them.

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joshdance
The companies providing the service could argue that they are improving
people's lives. Fast food give adequate calories fast. Payday loans give
needed money fast. Of course both are not beneficial long term and have huge
side effects, but you can't blame them. Except for lotteries. Lotteries you
can blame the providers.

Which is the government.

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JackFr
Lotteries (and insurance) allow one to trade first moment (expected value) for
higher moments (variance and skewness). That someone with very little would
try to increase his or her variance at the cost of a little bit of expected
value makes sense. That someone with very much would trade some expected value
for reducing his or her variance also maes sense.

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nonce42
"...marvel at the poor decisions of the poor" \- I've always wondered if rich
marvel at the bad decisions of the middle class in the same way. And what they
see as the big mistakes keeping them from being rich. E.g. the problem with
the middle class is they just don't understand the importance of
entrepreneurship / capital gains / ???

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RougeFemme
I think they do. There are always people on higher rungs of the socio-economic
ladder looking down at those on the lower runs and marveling about why they
can't pull themselves up. Sometimes they are looking at people only one rung
below.

I think rich people also marvel at the failure of the middle-class to not go
to the right schools, make the right connections, marry into the right
families, not take "full advantage of the tax code" (e.g., for Americans -
bank offshore).

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kstenerud
And the thing is, they are right.

Although you're probably not wealthy enough to go to the right schools, you
may be able to get in via scholarships.

Although a middle class pool of good connections is limited, there are ways
for a creative person to seek out better ones, often by something as simple as
changing their environment.

Tax code knowledge is useful and valuable, and can be learned if you're
willing to put the time and effort into it.

My point is, if you wish to elevate yourself, you must first study those whose
ranks you wish to join. Learn how they acquire, and, more importantly, keep
their wealth and power, and find ways to do so yourself, even if you have to
be scrappy to do it. The whole startup thing does just that in the business
world.

There will always be things you are simply blocked from doing. Instead of
focusing on how unfair that is, focus on the things you CAN do, even if it
requires greater effort or a more creative approach than someone more
privileged would need.

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tenpoundhammer
I have noticed this trend at many work places. Often the people who appear to
be working the "hardest", are the people that have spun their work lives into
a tapestry of chaos. Their schedules and workload are so intensely unmanaged
that the only thing they manage to do is commit to more things.

Unfortunately this sort of behavior is often encouraged by higher ups, because
it looks like you are doing a lot. However, I think it's obvious that spending
a lot of time in the office doesn't equate to getting a lot done.

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imperialdrive
I enjoyed reading this article (and am excited to read future comments)
because it resonates almost exactly with my current lifestyle and way of
thinking.

This happened to me ~8 years ago. Solution was to spend 5k on a solo trip, all
economy/hostel accommodations with a single backpack, walking around Europe
(Poland, Budapest, Portugal) with a quick trip to Japan. Inner peace levels
and happiness went up 10x what a 20k bonus ever provided me. It also helps to
realize how small we are, how truly big an impact we can make by via
technology, and that every single person you love, respect, run into will
eventually die in some misery, with regret that brings tears to their eyes no
matter how well they lived. So enjoy yourself, but don't take it too easy.

I'm a solutions engineer for tech startups which is generally very fun,
challenging work, but tech really is like heroin (wasn't there a HN link about
it?) and needs to be kept in-line.

If you anyone wants suggestions re. Europe travel, I'd be happy to share.

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precisioncoder
Didn't see an email in your profile so thought I'd reply here. I'd love to get
some advice about travel in Europe and travel to Japan. I'm living in Austria
and want to see this place while I have unrestricted travel =D

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adambard
I as well would like to subscribe to imperialdrive's newsletter.

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dmd149
I agree with your points, however, the major differences is what each spends
their 60 hour work weeks on.

The busy professional works on activities that has social prestige (even if it
is a lot of useless meetings and e-mail) and ultimately, these activities
build career capital which can be leveraged. Not to mention, they pay a lot
more.

The working poor may also work 60 hour weeks, but their work does not carry
social prestige, build career capital, or pay particularly well. Ultimately,
their work can not really be leveraged into opportunities to focus on the big
picture.

Again, I agree from a cognitive processing view that yes, both the working
poor and the busy professional partake in activities that distract from higher
value work, but the latter has much more opportunity to give himself breathing
room to focus.

Good post!

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alanctgardner2
> the latter has much more opportunity to give himself breathing room to focus

At first this just seemed like a kind of self-congratulatory post: 'Yes, sure,
cognitive bandwidth is a finite limit that affects kings and beggars alike,
but at least I'm accomplishing something with my life.' But then you pulled
out this whopper.

Do you honestly think that someone who is concerned about feeding their
children or paying their rent has more free time and bandwidth? Working
professionals have their own, imagined stresses associated with pumping up
their own importance, but these are much higher up Maslow's heirarchy than
basic physical needs.

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gjm11
I think the comment you're replying to says exactly the reverse of what you
think it does.

1\. Not "... but at least I'm accomplishing something in my life" but "... but
the busy professionals have an important advantage: the stuff they're
frantically doing is valued by other people, so that it gets them more money
and more social status".

2\. It's the busy professional, not the overworked underpaid poor person, that
the comment says has "more opportunity to give himself breathing room to
focus".

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alanctgardner2
My god, that was easy to misread (not your post, GP). I realize he was
referring to the immediately preceding sentence, where he inverted the order
from the much more prominent list. Sorry GP.

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bayesianhorse
One thing I keep coming back to is meditation. I believe it has improved my
productivity by being more in the moment, getting distracted less easily and
being more accountable with my mental bandwith.

Now if I could just curb my hackernews addiction...

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BetaCygni
It's a type of meditation that allows your mind to wander. Simultaneously you
pick up interesting bits of information and you practice your written
communication skills by writing clear and concise replies.

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bayesianhorse
If some activity satisfies some short term need, it's probably not
meditation...

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BetaCygni
I'm not an expert on meditation in any way, but for me the goal is an inner
peace, an inner tranquility that allows me to have a razor sharp focus on the
things I'm working on.

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photorized
_Re: What they 've discovered is that shortages lead people to make poor
decisions. That's because the brain can only process so much._

That's a real problem. Interestingly, I've experienced the opposite while
working on several things in parallel - not having "enough time" forces you to
make decisions instantly.

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RougeFemme
But in retrospect, is it possible you would have made "better" (however you
may define that) decisions if you had time to think about the decisions rather
than making them instantly?

Also, a lot of people delay important decision-making when they lack time - or
simply never make a much-needed decision at all, thus staying trapped,
financially, professionally, personally. . .

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photorized
I tend to over-analyze... So, my quick gut decisions are usually better.

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happimess
The tone of the first paragraph was jarring. "Most professionals" are
classist, judgmental pieces of shit? What?

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mikeweiss
This is ridiculous

