As a former poor person from an environment somewhere between working class and middle class (dad worked in auto parts stores, mom as a government bureaucrat) – I credit Hacker News and the internet at large with my relative financial freedom these days. Yes it took 10 years to get here, but ho boy would I never have even known to begin to start without what folks like patio11, tptacek, et al talked about and shared on here. Ramit’s newsletter helped too but he’s not on HN afaik.

The extent of my financial literacy education growing up was there is always more month at the end of the money … oh and you should save. The saving part never made sense to me, why would you put money in a savings account that just gets wiped out by taxes at the end of the year? So dumb.

And then I learned there’s more out there than savings accounts with 0.01% interest and that you yourself can be a good investment and just thinking about assets vs liabilities and how you prioritize each … oof. Whole new world!

To be fair to my parentals, my dad did make me read Rich Dad Poor Dad in high school or college after he started discovering this world himself. I think that formed a good fertile ground for much of what HN had to share.

Point is: The environment that influences you has a huge impact on life outcomes. Probably more than any other factor.