"NBA Syndrome" Helps Fuel Spiralling Inequality | Hacker News Reader

"NBA Syndrome" Helps Fuel Spiralling Inequality

alternet.org

6 pointsnostrademons15 comments

Wow, that was a really weird experience. I kept thinking "Well, people often have unexpected views on political controversies, but it's so unlike PB to use these bullshit rhetorical arguments." Only at the very end did I realize it was another PB.

Different Paul Buchheit, but I hate those rich people too. :)

A twist ending in a comment thread. Nice work, Paul.

The author kinda threw me for a bit. I don't think it's our Paul Buchheit (you didn't just become a professor, did you?), but it's an odd coincidence. Plus, it's on topic for startup news...

it's on topic for startup news

It's a bad analogy, though.

While basketball skills won't help you if you don't make the NBA (especially if you've sacrificed your education in the process), skills you learn as a tech entrepreneur are transferable/useful if you fail and have to do something more "practical".

Actually collegiate athletes earn on average more money than their non-athlete counterparts.[1] It's possible that this is not because of any learned skills, which would technically make you correct. However, although collegiate athletes often have lower GPAs than non-athletes, they have been shown to be equally proficient using more robust measures of cognitive development.[2]

I think Julian Robertson (famous for hiring only athletes) said it best shortly after he made his first billion shorting the copper market:

"I once said, 'Let's hire one complete nerd and see how he operates,'" Robertson recalls. "We never did. It would have been fascinating."

1. C.f. http://www.row2k.com/features/print_feature.cfm?id=82&ty...

2. Searching JSTOR for "cognitive development" + "athlete" should turn up the relevant studies.

/Good thing this isn't Slashdot or I'd be modded into oblivion

This reminds me of the findings of that study which said that tall people were more successful. That's partly because height correlates with intelligence (largely because of nutrition; it's not causal), and partly because, the researchers theorized, taller people had a physical advantage over their peers and didn't get bullied as much. Add to that the tendency for victims to remain victims forever, and you have yourself some strange data.

Am I saying that college athletes make more money because they get more respect? Kind of; it's late and I'm tired. What I really mean to say is that there are a lot of confounding factors.

Yes, and some i-banks are well-known for hiring former fighter pilots.

Still, we've drifted off topic: the original article was intended as a warning to kids who risk everything to make the NBA.

My point is that same analogy does not apply to tech startups.

Yep, it's bad economics. NBA == tournament theory, which I think is a zero sum game, whereas startups are not. And while if you compare people on a "Nth percentile" basis, sure, there are bound to be "winners and losers", but that doesn't take into effect that everyone may be better off.

At least if you're starting a business, you're in the right game. It's extremely unlikely that anyone will ever get rich working for someone else. Comfortable enough that they don't mind, maybe...

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I heartily recommend showdead: no.

Are we attacking the rich? or the military? or the education system?

Probably best to avoid attacking the military, all told.

Those same people were the ones who made me miserable for sucking ass at basketball, kickball, and all the other games I played in school, so I feel conflicted about this.

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