Couldn't help but contrast this to another item on the front page.. the irony of video game streamers making many times more than the lifetime earnings of Nobel Prize winners :)
Sports and Entertainment has always been a way to leap frog hard work.
I am not saying at all it is not deserved. I am quite ok with them earning millions. But it does make a lot of us pull this comparison, both in achievements for humanity and in effort spent in their endeavors.
I personally never played or wish to play the fame lottery, I prefer the hard work path.
I am guessing the most popular streamers have gotten where they are by hard work.
Yes some is luck, attractiveness, etc. But that's true in all careers.
Just because they're playing games doesn't mean they aren't working. Athletes get insane amounts of money to play games. They exert themselves more physically, but I expect being a top steamer day in and out isn't a cake walk either.
Yeah, a lot of people, especially younger folks that want to be a streamer, miss the fact that people don't watch streamers just to watch someone play a game, they watch them because the streamer is entertaining.
Unless you're an absolute god at whatever game you're playing, nobody wants to simply watch you play a game. People come for the live commentary and audience interaction.
Being a successful stream takes charisma and cleverness, and being clever and charismatic for 3+ hours straight to entertain your audience can be exhausting.
I think Kobe Bryant working on his free-throws from 4 AM to 8 PM every day for decades is much harder work than some dude making dogecoin over a weekend or minting an AI-generated NFT.
Wealth is not linear, it's not promised as the result of "hard work". Hard work helps, but it isn't the determining factor of whether or not you'll get a payout.
You must work hard in a domain that has public visibility and actually produces something of value to people. And yes, Basketball (and watching it) is extremely valuable to a lot of people.
There are plenty of professions where the people work just as hard as professional sports people. The wealth accumulated has nothing to do with working hard or not working hard, but rather with the public visibility of the outcome of the work (and ability to make money with that).
Many comments saying sports and streaming is hard work. Well, no doubt it is. Many pulling 12h or 16h work days. I agree.
Nevertheless, anyone that manage to have 5+ millions USD in property and savings before they are 30 got to a level of wealth in 10 years that 90% of people will not achieve in a lifetime.
Totally fine. My issue is with the streamers who promote socialism to their fans and say that wealth should be distributed, meanwhile pocketing a huge paycheck. I guess there's a market for stupidity. It's both funny and sad.
I think you'll find most socialists don't care about people having a few million, the issue is those hoarding hundreds of millions, or billions. Of course, I can't speak for everyone.
