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Comment by throwanem | Hacker News Reader

Get-rich-quick grifters, would be my guess.

Possibly that these smart young people view everything like highschool. Everything is a formula driven contest to outshine your peers for the limited spots at prestigious schools. Get the perfect grades, study nonstop for the SAT, find the perfect volunteer experience, get dad to shmooze with his senator friend for that shiny recommendation letter, get into Harvard.

Same thing on loop. After the prestigious internships and summa cum laude, they graduate into a FANG job at 21.

I think the criticism is that these people are conformists. They're good at following an obvious system to the T but has never innovated or taken risks in their life.

This attitude continues into job interviews: the thought that, if you work hard enough and have enough talent, you should get the job you want. In reality, you might just not be a match.

That’s a good insight. The problem, though, is that this pattern kinda works (until it doesn’t). Get your FAANG job at 21, follow the pattern to get promoted, get promoted, make more money, compete to buy a nice house, get married, have kids, compete to get your kid into the “best” preschool, then the “best” private school. Compete to get into the “best country club”, then retire and...play golf all day?

At that point you've got enough wealth built up that if you've played things right you have a part time job managing your own portfolio. And a lot of people on that route that I've met have vague ideas of doing charity work or something at that point.

I don’t think it necessarily has to be negative (which being a grifter implies). I think there are just some people who think of life as a game where you need to collect as many badges of “honor” as possible. Undergrad degree, business school, graduate degree, incubator, spouse, zip code, country club, etc.

That seems pretty negative to me. Or nihilistic, anyway. What's the point? To end up with a blue ribbon on your headstone?

I hear ya. I meant negative in the "chaotic evil" sense (which is what a grifter implies). This is more "bland/purposeless", which is indeed a different flavor of negative.

And btw I agree with you - not the path the an enriched life!

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