To think money is mostly about luck, not effort?

[TheGreyShark]

I’ve been thinking about how much luck plays a role in financial success. Some people work incredibly hard and never get ahead, while others are born into wealth, stumble into the right opportunities, or just happen to be in the right place at the right time.

I personally feel like the money I have is due to luck, not effort. If I’d been born in different circumstances or made different connections, my financial situation would be totally different.

AIBu to think money is mostly down to luck rather than hard work? Or is effort actually the key factor?

Lots of older people have been lucky with property prices simply because of when they were born.

very few entrepreneurs are self made & I think all the billionaires under 30 have come from
money.

It’s a bit of both.

I’m from an ordinary working class
background, went to a poor comprehensive school, etc.

I work in law and earn just less than six-figures. I’m not rich but I’m very comfortable. If my career path continues to partnership, the financial rewards are very considerable.

I got here by working hard and diligently at school, while others pissed around. I decided to go to University when others said it wasn’t for them, or a waste of time and money.

I chose a profession that is secure and that I knew paid extremely well if you’re at the right level. I don’t have a massive passion for it, I chose it specifically because of the opportunities and potential earnings.

I work long hours doing stressful, intellectually demanding work. The pay reflects that.

I feel I earn what I earn thanks to the choices I made and the effort I put in. That said, I have the “brains” to be able to do it, come from a stable family background, and some of my career progression has been right place-right time.

My DH came from very little. Loving but poor working class family. He wanted more. Studied for a decade post 18 and worked a 60 hour week for 25 years taking on huge responsibility. He wasn't lucky he just worked for it and took opportunities when they arose. Are surgeons lucky? I suspect you are just bitter.

I think that saying it’s luck really devalues people’s hard work. I also think that some people are depending on luck when they need to educating themselves on basic financial skills.

I have a theory that if you gave 3 people 100K and all started from the same position and told them they could do with it what they want. In a year you’d have 1 that had pissed it all away, 1 that is more or less in the same spot, and 1 that had increased it significantly.

I think it’s both. Luck plays a big role but so do choices about what you do with that luck. I was born poor but has a fabulous education due to brains (luck) and being born in a country that supported that (luck). I chose a degree and a career specifically for earning power, worked crazy hours and did well in it. But I also saved and made choices like living in a cheap area, didnt let my lifestyle inflate too much so I built assets. I’m not massively rich but I own two properties, have good pension and savings and I don’t worry about money, Many of my peers in my industry still have huge mortgages and are still quite financially insecure. But yes, there’s a lot of luck in it - I think choices once you have a good income make more difference. If you’ve got fuck all it’s hard to get out of that- you can’t save enough to really make a difference, and any small misfortune sets you back a lot. Once you have a cushion, through earnings and inheritance, you can make far more choices, good and bad, and things going wrong don’t blow you up so much.

Children and partners are optional, and part of the delayed gratification I mentioned.

Don your own oxygen mask first, as the airlines say. Or don’t complain to me about “bad luck.”

Absolutely not taking anything away from what you have achieved which is amazing and obviously done through hard work. However, I think there is luck here that may be hard to see because it is the absence of something terribly disruptive to have prevented you from following through with your plans, such as having a disabled child that forced one of you to give up work to become a carer. Or one of you have a life-changing accident etc. It might be unfair to say that you have been lucky by comparing it to someone else's misfortune but my point is that there are many reasons why people don't reach the same financial security, some of them completely unavoidable (not just spending on expensive holidays)

Also think financial education is so important. Debt is so toxic- not productive debt like a mortgage - whether you are low or high income debt can blow a hole in most people’s lives in the wrong circumstances. Having a small income but no debts you can’t pay is arguably more secure than big income and big debt that all goes to shit if you lose your job or something changes suddenly. And I say that as someone with a good income who nearly blew it all up in my 20s by living above my income, and seeing my mums house repossessed.

I think it's a bit of both hard work and luck.

Luck to be given the right opportunities, at the right time.

Hard work and confidence to make the most of those opportunities.

But maybe the air of confidence is what opens the opportunities, in the first place.

Tbh it’s luck nothing happened that set you off your path. When I just bought my flat, I saved every penny. Had everything on track: then my mum was diagnosed terminally ill and I had extra travel
expense to be there as much as I could plus all the expense that comes with funerals etc. then got made redundant. Hard woRomans dedication is one thing. Being set on your path and not having to stray from it IS lucky. Don’t take it for granted.

I wholeheartedly agree with this.
I think too it devalues those that have taken risk, worked hard, yes had some elements of luck, but have ruthlessly applied themselves to something.

It’s too easy just to say people are lucky when they’ve strived for success and foregone lots of things along the way. Successful entrepreneurs don’t just end up in that position by luck, they’ve been successful because of their actions, attitude to risk, intelligence and much much more.

In my case it's been a mixture of a lot of hard work, going without and then help and inheritance.

When I meet DH we had both left relationships which has left us with nothing but debt, we both had kids. Although we spent money on them, we went without ourselves, paid off debt and saved every penny we could to buy a house together. When we had saved a deposit my parents actually offered to buy the house for us and we pay them back. We gave them our deposit money and then worked to pay them back as quickly as possible, with some interest. I was then made redundant and had an excellent redundancy so was able to pay a lot more back.

We are now "mortgage" free and have kept working to save. Sadly one of my parents died as well and did leave us around £100k. So now we have more than expected but with all our children we will still work hard to grow this so we can try and help them one day.

I think it’s too easy to generalise , we are comfortable , mortgage free etc , I’m retired from a pt role , husband works ft . Neither of us have received any type of inheritance , nor are we likely to but we are both savers and my husband has worked hard over the years to put us in a good position .

It’s different for everyone. Some people work really hard and got to where they have by working hard at school, uni and job, others have had inheritances or got lucky with investments.
You can’t dismiss hard work. Some people have come from poor families, worked hard, faced racism and done well.

i was lucky to be born (besides with good health and some academic skills) to parents who had low paying jobs and told me regularly that i needed to finish school and choose a trade/skill/job where i could support myself without relying on a man. in a time when college was paid for by the government with only transport and book costs (minimal tuition). I was lucky to pass and find work in my profession AND when i couldn't figure out how to make ends meet I was lucky they remained supportive as i launched living on my own, i was lucky that friends and family talked about money. then i was lucky in choosing a stable spouse who assisted with child care and supported my fluctuating employment history as I juggled parenting/home management and going back to school. I was lucky that my work colleagues regularly talked pension savings and investments. i was lucky in many ways but all of it was hard work.

@Marshbird would love to know what you did with your savings to make them grow more

It’s not just down to luck.

To me luck is walking down the street and finding a pot of gold, I presume if people come into lots of money is winning the lottery (selecting the winning numbers), inheritance, working up the 'corporate ladder'/having your own business or company, inventing something or someone making a decision which leads to it like buying shares in a particular way maybe

none of this is luck

Actually no, I earn good money but it’s not luck. I went to school, then uni, searched for a graduate position and worked hard

Luck plays a part, no question. It’s what you choose to do with that luck that determines the long term results.

I frittered away the opportunity of a great education at a great school, but had brains enough to get in there. I had a very lucky break in being offered a job through a connection that set me on the road to a well paid career. However, many of my peers along the way did not have the ambition that I had. I fought and worked my way up, and worked hard. Not nearly as hard as those doing manual jobs though. Mine was long hours, constant travel, living in hotels across the country from my family for long periods. I gave it my all, at the expense of family time. At the same time, I made sure to invest as much as I could into our pension pots and pay off our mortgage.

Now semi retired, no debt and luckily still have my lovely DH. I’ve been very lucky in that regard - he kept the home fires burning.

It’s also priorities - my best friend and I work equally hard but I work in a job I don’t mind specifically because I knew the earning potential was very high, whereas she works in a job that she’s passionate about but the earning potential is low. We’re both lucky in our own ways and both work hard but she’ll never earn what I do and that’s a choice.

If you are born in to a wealthier family, get a good standard of education and are surrounded by successful people your odds of being successful are massively inflated compared to someone who grows up in poverty or even working class.

I went to a crap school where I was bullied throughout. We were poor as was everyone else. No one went to uni, (like maybe 3/4 out of roughly 100 kid) the expectation was you leave school and get a job. I didn’t go abroad until my teens. Didn’t visit a muesum or see a theatre show until adulthood. My world was pretty small and there was no internet to see a bigger picture. I did various minimum wage jobs after school. I got a degree in my thirties I now work in a customer service role earning 28k. I did buy property when it was cheap (due to being pregnant at 21 another norm where I grew up) I live in the same town but a nicer area, I married a man who had a lower middle class upbringing. He went to uni and works in a professional role. We now live in a big house and have what would be considered a middle class life where we live but probably more working class to wealthier people. A lot of the people I went to school with went to prison or live in poverty. .
I have two good friends from school, 1 grew up in similar circumstances to me but was exceptionally clever so went to uni and became a teacher. The other was poorer than me but also quite clever, got a job out of school in a hospital and worked her way up to manage a department.

Luck is definitely involved, but I wouldn't say mostly luck. Usually smarts, hard work and risk. But being born into a position where you have opportunities, is also of course luck. You also hear of so many people who win the lottery then lose it all, so that goes to show there's a little bit more to it.

well it is really biology King Charles, for example, was born because his parents had sex and his mum got pregnant, I wasnt there at the time but I presume it was sex not luck that this all happened?

even winning the lottery only happens as your numbers on your ticket match what is drawn so I would say that is chance not luck?