There definitely is a relationship between money and happiness but it's a pretty small one so like for example doubling your income consistently has about the effect on happiness so going from forty thousand to eight thousand dollars a year has the same effect of going from four million to eight million dollars a year so basically you're in this kind of treadmill where you need to keep on raising it by more and more to get a happiness boost. Do you know you book is absolutely awesome this is this is what people want someone has access to loads of data to actually come up with and do just tell me how to live my life please just give me the money ball for my existence that would be great thank you. Yeah that was the motivation for the book is that I like it's a little bit of book I want to read because I'm obsessed with self health it's a little embarrassing because I was such an intellectual and my bookshelve just filled with self health like how to get more powerful when I was single how to date better how to be happier whatever and I'm so frustrated read all these books and I'm like I just don't believe I'm like this is really based on very much is you just like had an idea and just told me it's not like up to the rigorous standards that I come to expect from data analysis so I'm kind of just like okay what would actually be like what is this explore all the areas of life and just said what the data tells you on it. Like you know like I also know a lot of self health books when they say they're evidence based or like science based somebody just has a point they want to make and they just Google some study that confirms it and like that's not how I wrote this book I really have no idea what I was saying on any topic I don't want to say about dating I don't want to say about entrepreneurship I don't want to say about happiness and I'm just like gonna find the best studies and the best data and the best whatever and then like here that's what I'm saying now so yeah.
It does make other books feel in inconsistent and insubstantial you're like hang on a second what did you just tell me a nice story but this is just it's just a story. The story that happens to fit some eat pray love narrative that sounds nice. I think it's right I think it's also a misconception that people just want to read stories like that's kind of an idea that they tell authors you know you just tell stories tell stories tell stories and like everybody who's read my book so far which I'm just gonna say the name a lot don't trust your gut. People remember it but everyone's read my book has been like I've been enthralled by the tables and the charts which is like not again that's not usually what you put in self health books like tables and charts.
Just by a nice bar chart that's what needed. People are like coming back with like very subtle points like the other like wow the closest everybody was reading the book was actually the tables and charts and figures and I'm like oh I think there were misconceptions about the cell about the audience for books and what they actually want. I think people do want things that are a little more substantial and like a little more data driven so. I think a big reason for that is because it is quite counter to much of what gets put out there.
The guy called Stephen Kotler who runs the flow research collective and he looks at the science of getting your body into a flow state but he looks at it from a biological level right this isn't a philosophical level this isn't how it contributes to your meaning it's what is the actual brainwave state you're supposed to be in what does this mean for your heart rate what does this mean for your respiratory rate what does this mean for your average body temperature what are the exercises and the strategies that you can do to influence yourself to move you towards that and you're like it felt me to you is a really nice way to put it. You're reading this book and you're like yeah there's something firm for me to press up against here and I think that I think that finding something firm as in the data is a good place to look. You decided off the back of said book to do a nerdy makeover a day to dream makeover I'm not. I'm not going to be twice though because I'm to I'm your side which are your side is that you can't see far away so yeah I did this analysis there's all this evidence I didn't know about it so I started researching this book on how much your looks influence your success in life.
So like it's really depressing and dark like they show pictures of two candidates. You know gubernatorial election senate candidates and they're like which one looks more competent and this research by this guy Alex told off and others and 70% of the election. They can predict just just based on the candidate that people said look more competent wins and just like that is so depressing like what like we're all in high school basically we can't we've never escaped high school and studies like who rise to the top of the military is people just look dominant and they're like oh there's a baby that people look baby faced like are more likely to get off their crop like not be convicted of the crime. I was like oh yeah no not that guy.
I'm just like are you kidding me? I was getting like anger and anger there but then I'm like wait a second there was this other study where they said that the same person can be rated very differently based on like little changes they make. So I'm like wait a second it's not just whining about how like you know unfair it is you got to take advantage of this you got to like find your best look and I use this tool. Yeah the world's nerdiest makeover.
Face app is this like app everyone can play around with it you can kind of change around what happens when I have glasses what happens when I have a beer what happens when I have a mustache go to just change everything about you. And then I ask people to rate like how I look how competent I looked in these different things I use this service the best way to do it now is a site I know about photo feeler.com and you want to do this like you can just match what I did. So you go to face app you create different for yourself you go to photo feeler.com and you can get ratings on them and how you look on various dimensions. And then for me there is like really clear patterns that everyone rate me way more competent when I had a beer and had glasses.
And it was like stark it was like strength that anything else I did everything else I did better like oh you can add like a smile. Different smiles no difference different types of glasses no real difference like even I shave my head it wasn't even that much worse which I may be heading towards because I'm going balls. I'm like what if I'm like a six on confidence and then with the shape to I'm like a two I'm then I'm really screwed because baldness is coming faster me. So or I guess if I based on that then I would have gotten like a hair transplant I guess but I'm just like oh there are these two things glasses and beard and they're just the huge difference makers for me.
Why do you want to optimize for competence? Well I say because like I tested a few of them and they were all they're all pretty highly correlated so like I said now that I'm happily in a relationship I say go like oh attractiveness 100%. I think I can go for attractiveness too because I was too scared of the results. I'm like what if I put it in there and I was like you're 0.1 I'm like oh god I'm going to really get in my head.
Whereas like I'm confident maybe like I'll do a little better I'll do a little bit of nerdy I'm going to be like you're confident but I think I focus on confidence more because I'm in a really I'm in a relationship I feel like I don't really need to win over people to track this. And then I was talking to someone Steven Levitt the co-author of Greek economics and I told him this and he's like no no that is your first mistake you always need to keep the attractiveness high if you're a partner. Don't get don't get lazy on the attractiveness run just because you're in a relationship. But it was like it was very clear thing I really think everyone can do this like I had to use these tools because I didn't know about Photo Feeler I just found out about that recently but literally face that plus Photo Feeler anybody could do what I did like really really simply and Photo Feeler also does a whole bunch of different traits so they do competence and smart and like all kinds of different things you get it back really quickly.
So I bet you everybody will find out these little things like I did like it's just beer and glasses are like the game changers. That's just the universal panacea across the board that every woman. I think the point is that it's like the point is they're obviously going to be individual variation that's why you got to do this study. So there are some people that are going to do well you know I think glasses on and competence may be pretty close to universal.
We are just so tricked by glasses and like everybody just looks smarter when they have a third less is on but you know but like beard I think they're talking about my face that I think is just like a beard like kind of I think a beard kind of offers it. There's some like that particularly that beards are just like very good on like James Harden the basketball player I was like why is this guy this crazy beard that I saw pictures before he had a beard and he's like missing a chin. Have you seen do you know Kazma Chimayev do you know who that is? So he is one of these he's an absolute animal in the middleweight division in the UFC and this guy is there's multiple series of videos talking about how he's a legitimate psychopath on YouTube with and he's like everyone loves him for the fact that he's just ready to go at all times and if you want to go and have a laugh Google Kazma Chimayev without a beard and it is he's missing a chin.
There is no chin there it is simply a beard growing out from his neck and you're like so much more intimidating with a beard than without one so he's optimizing for intimidation you were optimizing for Compton. When I tracked his beard was not a higher score as well so I think there there is confidence and attractiveness are very highly correlated. Usually the things usually like a look is better on like every front it's not like there's you're usually not trading off like you know what one of the other usually like there's a look for you I think it's pretty clear that glasses and and beard is my look. What were the big lessons that you learned from data about being successful in dating them.
There are like a lot of different lessons there okay so one of them is from I want this to be a part of it but I you haven't you need to know it Christian Rudder wrote this excellent book dataclysum and he made the point that the most successful daters are like the very most successful daters are exactly you'd expect they're like Brad Pitt and Natalie Portman just beautiful people and they just get like it's depressing how much better they do than the average person like. But then like there are these there are these daters that do shockingly well and there are people with extreme looks like people who shave their head like what happens when you shave their head or have crazy glasses or blue hair all these things and the point is in dating you want to be polarizing. So if you're Brad Pitt or Natalie Portman you just want to be yourself and not scare anybody just like play very safe let the goodies blood to you but if you are not Natalie Portman or Brad Pitt or you're not like eventually most attractive person you got a kind of. And then some people be totally turned off but some people be really into you and that's kind of what's that's all that matters you just need some people be really into you and I kind of did that my old life because.
I think it's not going to surprise anybody that like I'm pretty dirty I mean everybody read don't trust or go out with this guy's pretty dirty like. There's this one study where they list the happiest they have a chart with the happy how much happiness every activity gives people and literally order an iPhone case with that chart on it so I can look at the data and decide what to do things so I'm like the dirtiest like I'm maybe one of the dirtiest people anybody's counter. And I think when I was single like a lot of nerds I'm like well what do I do to heterosexual to attract women and I'm like okay well I gotta tone it down be less nerdy be you know like get rid of the glasses get get like you know stop talking about the charts and the tables and the bath and like you know learn to talk more about what you're taught that the average woman is into and I think the data suggests the exact opposite like nerd it off go all in on who you are and then you just be polarizing but you don't in date you don't want to be like average to people you want to be like the extreme something that's the most the most appealing because you're not optimizing for total area under the curve are you you only need a couple of winners. And yeah exactly and I think a couple of winners.
I'm an optimist so I was just like a one winner but I yeah and my girlfriend's literally she was talking to her friends and they're like what's your type and everyone's going through their type like tall dark and handsome this that and she's like my type is nerdy and like that was her type and she's not even that nerdy and then you know and here I am if I had not played off my dirtyness I went up of had a chance I think the thing that the other big dating thing is you gotta put yourself out there way more. So they've done these studies are like what happens when people have different attractiveness or desire ability ratings message someone else on an online dating site. It's like what happens when a one message is 10 on an online date site. And before I saw the data I'm like this is a bloodbath this is like a one has to add I mean or a message and we're talking about like a one in a billion a one in a billion like come on like that's not going to happen.
And the data says for a heterosexual man one asking out a heterosexual 10 it's like 14% and for a heterosexual woman asking out a one ask going after a heterosexual man it's like 30%. So like when you actually do the math the key to getting like if you if you want to date on your league which I don't necessarily recommend because I was having a section how physical and conventional track is most overvalued thing in the day but let's be honest everybody's trying to like everybody is curious how can I take someone who's way more beautiful or way more desirable than me. And I think it's a combination of being a stream version yourself and then asking tons of people out because like if you have a 14% chance on one go then you actually do the math if you ask like 30 people out you have like a 98% chance. So like all you got to do is just keep on going after and a lot of people are going to be like no no no no and eventually you're going to get your your guess and then there are there are other things I keep going there.
What was the insight around physical attractiveness and happiness. Yes they got studies of like 11,000 couples and they tried to predict what what predicts romantic happiness was a man to Joel led it by the study. And it's like a revolutionary study of romantic happiness that they use machine learning models there are 86 scientists studying it like 11,000 couples and hundreds of variables like anything you could consider a test. And the first thing is it's very hard in general to predict who's happy like the predictive models are just way worse than you might imagine it's not like predicting I don't know predicting like the weather tomorrow or something it's like predicting the weather in like three years.
It's harder than you would guess but that's it. The things that that do have at least some pretty good power whether I'm happy with someone else whether a pretty good person has the quality of the other person that seems to have some pretty good power are like these psychological variables. So secure attachment style, growth mindset, conscientiousness, satisfaction with life kind of like good psychological variables and the things that don't have that have like basically no predictive power are a lot of superficial things so conventional attractiveness or the height of your partner, the particular occupation of your partner many things like that. So like so yeah so I think like the major insight from the data on dating and romance is there's just a total disconnect between what people are trying to like what people are swiping for or trying to date and what actually makes people happy.
You know will people change based on knowing that I don't know I think it may be coded in our DNA that we're drawn to like beauty and you know height and status and but like if you can I really to recommend overruling some of those instincts because they're really not a path. To what their happiness and like the other thing is you have to think is that the competition for these traits is so enormous that like even if you win over someone like if you win over someone who is this great beauty or woman everybody will every woman's there are I think the data is 85% of women or I don't have the exact number have like six footer above on bubble or whatever it is it's something. I think it's only 14% of men in the US. Yeah yeah it's like and like so the competition for these people are is ferocious and you have to think that if you first of all if you try to take these people you may spend a huge percent of your life single and complain that you're single.
I think a lot of people are eventually single they're trying to date the small number of people that everybody's trying to date. And number two if you do win them over you may find that they are like that there's a reason that they were single even though they have all these traits that everybody is desiring so maybe there's psychological traits are a little bit. So I would love to see I would love to see the physical characteristics mapped with the psychological traits know what the correlates between our taller people on average more conscientious or more industrious so I have more balance because that would be fascinating to see because it could be that actually could be that in order to be with someone who's hot you need to sacrifice being with someone who's psychologically it's probably not likely right they're probably pretty just randomly spread but that could be the case. I think if you're not fine and you want to take someone high then you probably do have to sacrifice.
If you're like if you're hot yourself then you're probably like okay you know it's probably it's somewhat of a bargain you're probably an embedded. You can always date across and down. The interesting thing there is what you're kind of saying is similar to what John Burgess says in Make the First Move where it's not lowering your standards it's changing what your standards consist of because what you're saying is that what you think your standards should be what they should be you're optimizing for the wrong parameters what you're optimizing for is something like the right and job title and a bunch of things which aren't going to impact the thing that you ultimately want which is long term relationship happiness what you need to do is reset that and by doing that you actually open up an entire new market which is less competitive potentially untapped and significantly more linear between where you are and where you want to be in terms of happiness. Yeah but nobody wants to hear that advice.
How do I get the hot person said how do I get the 50. I told you the way to get the hot person is to be an extreme version yourself and ask out lots of people and the other thing I didn't say is take advantage of similarity. So people are incredibly drawn but this is also shown in dating apps to people who are similar themselves like on every trait you can imagine so race people are drawn to people are similar themselves religion like high credit high to something very even like college people just want to date someone of a similar education level they like show a bonus to someone who went to their exact same university even if it's like relative to someone in a similar ranked university that there's and then oh my favorite example of this is we're 11.3% more likely on online dating apps to match with someone who shares our initials which is so ridiculous like come on initials like share your initials is not the path to long term happiness but so I think there's a lot of irrational now that but you can take advantage of that in that try like if you share your initials with someone definitely ask them out because you have this bonus. Alright you've got like the multiplier that's the 11.4% multiplier on that.
Oh well she's a 9 out of 10 but she does have my initials so if I take that she's actually only she's like a parameter adjusted eight and a half with one account for the name buyers. But yeah and I think I learned this in my single life where I am Jewish and but I'm not religious at all and I always pride myself on not caring about religion like I would be happy to date somebody of any religious backgrounds any cultural background whatever it's not something that I view is very very important to me. But I did kind of notice that the quality of my dates were always higher with the Jewish community and the non Jewish community because of the similarity bias so even if I don't care like even if it's not a preference for me I can take advantage of the fact that it's a preference for other people and I should probably be more likely to go to like a singles event for Jewish people than a singles event for non Jewish people because the non Jewish singles event I'm gonna be a five or whatever but Jewish privilege. It's Chinese privilege in the Chinese event it's Asian privilege in that yeah I understand.
And it's like it's true for Asian males as well there I talk about that there's a huge prejudice against Asian males and online dating. But there's much less prejudice from Asian women in this group so yeah it's a privilege that like you know again my major advice is care less about the superficial things I just try to find someone who's like really nice and can make you happy and if you can get to that mindset. You're gonna find dating way way easier but if you want to date like a hot person then you have to use all these strategies and everything that I think are justified to use your privilege is one of them. What about what makes people happy then you look at that.
Yeah so what makes you happy I read like a thousand studies on happiness and a lot of that even ones that are really famous. I'm like these studies aren't that good they interview like a hundred undergraduate students and they're like so what makes you happy I'm like how should I know that these hundred undergrad students or anything like anybody else you. You're not like doing experiments it's just was very underwhelming but they're these new projects which are really cool they're called experience sampling projects and they basically ping people on their smartphones and they say what are you doing who are you with and how happy are you. And they built a data set of like three million happy points the biggest one happiness George McHair and Suzanne Rotto three million happy points and they're always cool size I get so excited because I just as I said very dirty.
So like we want to say people are happier the same person the same activity same people are happier when they're in nature by a lake or they're happier when their environment is beautiful or they're happiest going for a height or having sex is the normal one happy activity. And I'm kind of like I was telling my friends as I was working on the chapter I'm like you know do you care about this cool study and they're like do we need scientists to tell us this. Like that's so obvious like all these things that you're saying are painfully obvious and I think there's profundity and the obviousness of the research on happiness which is that the things that make you happy like if you look at the happiness activity chart from Alex Bryson and George McCarran one of my and that's what I recommend people get as an iPhone case or hang it on your wall or whatever. And you look at that chart it's almost like a chart from our hunter gathering days it's like people are happy like you know having sex taking walks hunting and fishing gardening like just like these very outdoors simple activities and the things that are really low are these like very modern things like waiting on a line dealing with a bureaucracy working Internet social media very very low computer games really really low when you actually think people are happy or they rank very low.
It's good to keep in mind like the simplicity of the things that make people happy and if you're not happy. Oh I end the book I say what's the data driven answer to life based on these three million you know happiness points and all this new data and I go the data driven answer to life is to be with your love on an 80 degree and sunny day overlooking a beautiful body of water having sex. Which is okay not rocket science it's not like they you know scientists have found some like gel you put on yourself or some website you visit that's like the cure to happiness it's these very old fashioned simple things and I do recommend two people who are not having sex. I'm happy like think about how far your life is from that most simple things that from the data driven answer like how much time you spend your day to your how much time you spend on the internet in comparison.
How much time you spend with the people make you have your friends and romantic partners and everybody else just doesn't make you happy. You had a list of underrated activities the things that tend to make people happier than they predict exhibitions museums libraries sports and exercise drinking alcohol gardening and shopping or errands and then the overrated activities that make people less happy than they think sleeping resting relaxing computer games watching TV eating and browsing the internet. I'm surprised and I was really surprised when I looked at the list of activities that playing with pets wasn't higher it's like maybe 15 I think but dude if you put a dog in this room I'm not doing anything for the rest of the day like that's me that's me in the dog someone you want to have some sex it's like no sorry with the dog at the moment so again there's individual variation in that. Having sex with the person that no don't do that so drinking alcohol was an interesting one and I think that you talk about this it's not necessarily just about what the activity does but it's about what you're doing while you're in the activity right so drinking alcohol is often associated it's like socializing or spending time with friends you're having a conversation maybe you're also at a show or a comedy event or.
Watching a gig or something like that. Yeah I mean train alcohol what you're getting with the pet example is there probably is individual variation in these and you don't have to. Although I think a danger with happiness is we exaggerate how much individual variation there is there's been studies where they get compared introverts and extroverts and they say how much happier they are when they're by themselves or with other people. And both introverts and extroverts get the exact same boost from being with other people than being by themselves even though you ask introverts they're like yeah yeah I really like being by myself I really like being by myself.
So I think there's a danger like I'd be I'd be a little wary of I were you like I asked you to actually track your happiness and see if you're getting as much happiness from pets as you might think because I think we do tell ourselves these stories tell ourselves these stories that are not always correct and that we're like unique and. So I don't know I mean yeah I think there's also different times to them with pets so sometimes like if you're just like. You know like petting them playing catch with them that's one thing you're cleaning up their craft. One thing I thought it was interesting is there a tension between happiness and meaning so does this Roy Baumice study paper that you've probably read about the tension that you have between these two different things and there's a lot of things that we can do in the moment which makes us feel happy sort of more on the hedonics side but long term doesn't necessarily create meaning.
Did you think about this? I did like I think. Yeah you know like for example work scores very low on happiness and I think you know I don't know the answer from that is just quit your job and. Yeah.
Yeah I don't and you know the study that I referenced in happiness isn't following people over three years and being like. You know you see kind of in the moment happiness and you don't necessarily see as much the long term things I do think it's just. It's just I think from these studies you just can not yourself a little bit in the direction of things that make people happy that's kind of why so that sacrificing everything that's meaningful to you so don't you know if you read. Don't trust your God or you read these studies I don't and then yeah you immediately quit your job and move to a lake like I'd be like that maybe taking the advice a little too seriously I think I think more clearly but anybody who reads these studies and then.
The next weekend is deciding to sit at home and blank computer games or going for a walk with your friends by the water. And it is kind of uncertain like I really recommend you went with your friends on the walk by the water just based on the data so. What did social media use to people's happiness you look to that in depth yeah yeah so so they're so in the map in a study. The single there are 26 leisure activities the single lowest scoring leisure activity is using social media which already says wow that's probably not so good for you and there happened there was a famous randomized controlled trial where they pay people to stop using Facebook they randomly paid a group of people to stop using Facebook and they reported an enormous decline in depressive symptoms so I think there really is pretty it's almost a cliche to say it but there really is evidence that social media can make people miserable for the obvious reason that.
It's makes you feel like crap about your life you know if you're seeing on Facebook like the curate version of everybody else's life. I actually my first book everybody lies I talk a lot about that and the difference between like social media real life and Google searches and on social media when people describe their husbands. It's my husband is the best the greatest so cute and adorable and that's like public everyone seeing it and when it's not when they're searching my husband is it's like my husband is a jerk annoying mean like a totally different. Not exactly.
Not having sex with me. So there's so like social media like it's a cliche to say it but it's just so true it really is a dangerous game to play from a happiness perspective. Why do you think it is that we're so bad at working at what makes us happy? Well I think the world's trying to trick us.
Like there are people I mean social media we're up against forces more powerful than we are which are doing all these A.B. tests to try to make the most addictive products possible and like you know I talk about money and happiness and there definitely is a relationship between money and happiness but it's a pretty small one. So like for example others are back in killing worth doubling your income consistently has about the effect on happiness. So going from $40,000 to $80,000 a year has the same effect of going from $4 million to $8 million a year has the same effect of going from you know like so basically you're in this kind of treadmill where you need to keep on raising it by more and more to get a happiness boost.
Now of course like I sound like conspiracy theorists and these ideas are all so cliche but they're just true you know advertisements don't want you to think that money doesn't matter they want you to think that you need. You know you need the fanciest products and so they're kind of telling you brainwashing you a little bit on the things that will make you happy that you know they're also been studies that the purchases that make people happy and it's very rarely stopped it's usually vacations travel gives the biggest boost to happiness when you kind of ask people what are you doing and how happy you are and what product are using the only products that really are giving people happiness or trips and other experiences frequently with their romantic partner their friends. So like museums tours stuff like that. Yeah so things like that could legitimately give you happiness boost they're usually not even that expensive but when people are using a fancy new electronic or you know wearing an Armani suit they're not really getting a big happiness boost so I think that's an example why are we wrong well like Armani probably spends more time advertising than like the Grand Canyon does so you know like if you're trying to do not really seeing many advertisements have you thought of taking a camping trip with your friends because Grand Canyon is a nonprofit they're not even making money.
So it's yeah so I think we're getting kind of the wrong messages about the path to happiness. What is it there's that famous study that said above 70,000 dollars a year money has no impact on happiness it seems like what you're saying here is that that's bullshit. It's not true but it's it's true in that the effects level off a lot so it's not literally true that you reach 75,000 than money doesn't improve things at all but going from you know 40,000 to 80,000 is the same as going from 80,000 to 160,000 so it's it's it's not true in that the effects level off a lot. It's just it doesn't level off to zero there is also some evidence that like once you reach about eight million dollars you also get a boost.
I think the reason for that is that then you're reaching a point and I've started since I moved to New York I've met a lot of people in that camp of eight million dollars and well beyond and I think they're at a level where they literally have everything taken care of them for them and you see the happiness activity chart that that I couldn't trust your gut and like they're all these miserable that's going to be a lot of people who are in the camp. And you see the happiness activity chart that that I couldn't trust your gut and like they're all these miserable activities you know standing on lines work. How's work? How's work like they really don't make people happy and when you reach eight billion dollars net worth or beyond you don't have to spend much of your life doing those things.
That's the point at which the driver or the assistant can stand in line for you when the chef in cookie breakfast when the housekeeper can clean up blah blah. Yeah and then you really can't spend most of your life just by a beach having sex in 80 degree weather. All right so talking about people that have stupid amounts of wealth what's the best way to become rich. So I actually there's a study I read again most times I read a study I'm just like that's like I don't believe the study or I'm like it's like they make these subtle points you know like if you read any academic study like usually they're just like maybe very subtle interactions like the right of a point that only the research you care about but in case you read a sentence that kind of blows your mind and I was reading a study from the entire universe of taxpayers American taxpayers and they analyze who's in the top point 1% so it's people making 1.5 million dollars a year.
So these are people approaching the level where you can't actually just be happy with how much money you have and they said that the typical rich American is the owner of a regional business such as an auto dealership or beverage distributor. And I read that I'm just like what like who thinks I'm an auto dealer owner like auto dealers just like he's annoying like people with greasy suits who try to sell us like things we don't need you're not really thinking of them as like rich people and then beverage just read or even know what that was. And it turns out that so like the likely so there are a couple of points is one is you have to own something to get rich by and large. So like if you look at the richest Americans members the top point 1% about 84% of them are making their money primarily by owning something not by paying pay to salary.
So there are some people are just like get paid a ton of money. Superstar lawyers maybe or stuff like that. Yeah yeah occasionally but usually as people are owning something and then you want to have like some sort of a good and then you want to go on a good field. So there are all these fields that are awful.
I think some studies the quickest field businesses like the go out of the field where the business goes out of business quickest. And like number one was record store. The average record store last 2.5 years in comparison the average deficit office last 19.5 years. And basically the problem is everybody wants to own a record store.
There are all these movies made about record stores. Like there have been a whole bunch of record store movies. I think probably every time some of that movie comes out everyone's like I'm going to quit my job and start a record store. And it's just like not a good path.
And like twice stores an awful business clothing store is awful business. There's some other ones. But then there are things you basically want to local you want to local monopoly where like so auto dealerships there they have like legal protections where you kind of have franchise rights to service a particular car company in your local region. And that's a big advantage in business if you have legal protections about some random person coming in and stealing your business.
I think now so I think you can't really read this this that and say okay now I'll just start a local deal. I'll now just start an auto dealership because the whole point of auto dealerships is not allowed to start to do one and compete with these people. But I think you want to be thinking that principle of like what's my local monopoly that allows me to avoid someone stealing my entire business or offering a lower price or anything. And even I talk about the book that like independent creatives may be a better bet than I had thought.
Being kind of like what you're doing like a podcast host or when I'm doing a writer. And it's there are like a surprise. I was surprised by how many people are entering the top 1% or even the top 0.1% as independent creatives. It's still a long shot.
Most people aren't. But it's not like as being a long shot is like what and I think the reason for that is you have a local monopoly. So like if Chris you know as you're building your brand. You build a fan base and then like everybody could be on 20 different podcasts when your fans are going to listen to your podcast and watch.
You can ask the same questions you could be like someone else could be you know should I play with my pet or have sex and these exact same questions but you're going to have an edge because you build a fan base. And similarly you know I bring some books and people I already have like people who like everybody lies but first book and now they're going to give me kind of the benefit of the doubt. And I don't trust you guys you do have this kind of a little bit of a vote as a creative that like I think it's a better business than like pest control or something. Or like even some boring businesses like pest control the data says like basically nobody's getting rich from pest control businesses.
And the problem with being in the pest control business is you don't you're there's no way to build a local monopoly like you're basically competing against everybody and everybody's just googling for pest control and you have any profit you have you're going to give away and add on Google to try to get higher up on the list like nobody's like you know there's no name pest control or there's no legal protection. I really like Seth's pest control because of the personality that he brings when he's getting rid of my cockroaches. Yeah nobody's yeah nobody's and like you don't even have that many repeat customers anyway so there's just like not. Yeah.
It's really hard to escape the perfect competition that feels like the same for competition you either need like a legal protection like all of these do ships have you need like some sort of personal context being like really deep in a field or you need like a fan base. Yeah it's a unique way to imprint a difficult to replicate competitive advantage and you see this with PT's so my old housemate Lewis is PT and he moved I think to two or three different gyms in the time that he was living with me and these gyms were three miles to one of them and then another five miles to a different one around the city and I was like dude there isn't felt really bad I was like well if you lose his all of his clients tons of his clients stayed with him. Hang on a second you're talking about someone maybe adding two hours a week onto their commute just to go and train with you two or three times and people were prepared to go brand new facility different gym different place different parking different route. And they stuck with him because it's a very personal experience right people aren't you're not just being competed out of the market with this very transactional sort of pest control get rid of my cockroaches thing it's something very very specific.
Speaking of online coaching what was that analysis about the best way to sell a product online if you were doing like a seminar or something. Yeah they did an analysis of like Amazon live where they were people are kind of making a picture trying to sell their product it was a really amazing study they used artificial intelligence to translate all the pitches into like the facial expression. They analyze the facial expression everyone making their pitch and they have all kinds of other data about the pitch and they knew how much of the product actually sold and they found that the best way to sell your product is basically a poker face. So if you're angry or like depressed or like sad or like you know then like yeah everyone's like I don't want to watch this person but too many people selling their products have smiles like these goofy smiles on their face and are too excited and that actually backfires there's like a sweet spot where you're not showing too much happiness or too much sadness.
I think they say the officers that say having a poker face instead of a smile is about twice as valuable as free shipping. So which is kind of counterintuitive you don't really think like you know I think everybody's instinct is be like really excited for what you have. I think that you know the side and it's like the nitty gritty I'm sure if you were to have the poker face for like an hour everyone be like show me a smile like light enough relax show some happiness but it does show the danger that there is a danger in selling things of being too excited by your product and kind of being a little more even and honest can help. What about some of the myths to do with entrepreneurial success.
Yeah so entrepreneurial success there's this famous idea that entrepreneurs are young so like Mark Zuckerberg started Facebook when he was 19 Steve Jobs was 20 start Apple Bill Gates 19 Microsoft he's the most famous entrepreneurs in the world and I think people think they're also the most famous entrepreneurs featured in the media so they've done studies of the entrepreneurs in magazines and like the median age is 27 or something. So people just love telling the stories of these young people when you actually look at the data of the entire universe of entrepreneurs the average successful entrepreneur is 42 and the odds of an entrepreneur succeeding increase until the age of 60. Which shocks me like you don't think of a 60 year old like that's the total opposite of a successful entrepreneur and the other and like what it turns out is there's pretty much a formula for being a successful entrepreneur you just get really deep into the nitty gritty of a field for many many years and then you branch out on your own when you're ready. I was like just come from the outside knowing nothing when you're 18 it's not true like if you want to be out there the best path is like take it slow.
I'm just learning about a field work as an employee prove your work as an employee and then like learn something very particular about that field and you really know what to do when you're ready so. Well yes it's such a compelling narrative that outside his edge right the Elon Musk he never did a thing before so from first principles he's going to do whatever you go well. Yeah but the guys that Elon got to design batteries have probably spent their entire lives designing batteries you know he didn't get he didn't get some dude that did woodwork for the last for the last 20 years and you talk about Paul Graham as well and that the marginal marginal edge or something as well. Yeah power the marginal that's a huge paul grand fan of this essay like that's an advantage to being a bad employee because you're good employee you're not going to fit in entrepreneurship and it's not true in the data at all the best entrepreneurs like earned in the 99.9% time of income before they start their business.
So I think a problem with understanding how the world works is like some of the most compelling that they will us like we want them to believe we want to believe them to watch everybody wants to believe that. Oh tomorrow I can just like wake up and decide new car. You know decide some new chemical that's going to do something really wild or you know there are all kinds of examples you imagine it's kind of like that's not really how the world works and it's dangerous to think the world works there because I think a lot of people screw up their lives. I think about how sticky some of these stories are the stickiness of the story about the average age of a founder in an entrepreneur in Silicon Valley is 27.5 years old or something that's so much more worthy of being pushed around than a two mid 40's because that's what everybody would have thought you talk about this you say it's the counter counter intuitive narrative it's so bizarre think about the fact that.
The thing that everybody expects to be the case work hard in one field get unbelievable specific knowledge then branch out on your own once you've got to the complete top having been a very good employee and wait wait a long time until you've got to experience like the fact that. The media has managed to convince us that that is now a revolutionary story we were the idiots. But yeah I think like this is this podcast like you can overrule that I think when people have seen that they've been like oh yeah like they made different decisions based on that you can just look at these charts and. Look at these charges clears away the noise a little bit we're just like okay like now I know that I'm just being misled by the media and I'm going to just look at these charts and remind myself when I get these one off stories that are.
I meant to confuse me and so sticky so I think you can. I agree that it's like it's hard to get these ideas out out there but I think a lot of people have told me from reading that section that they are like. I'm not going to quit their job tomorrow and try to do something they've never tried before and some of them are using this an optimistic way where there are a lot of people who are. Forty five years old they've been an employee their entire life and they've had success in that field but they're just like up to it's too late like entrepreneurs are.
Twenty years younger than me exactly how I get to be against all these young ends and I think they'll be particularly drawn to this idea because now they can be like well now I gotta think about do I want to go off on my own and start my own business. How can people have to look. Yeah so there are all these studies the best way to learn about luck is the art world because the art world is so much luck like they're always like these depressing studies of what it takes to like what why a particular art is really successful there's so much randomness in it. But there are also these patterns that allow people to kind of allow these random opportunities to come to that so for example there have been studies that the quantity of art of art someone makes is a massive predictor of how successful they are so just putting a lot of work out in the world.
Success why is that because there's so much randomness in what particular work touches on you just got to kind of flood the market and let like I do you know if it's if there's if every piece which piece wins is luck then I want to be the one with a thousand pieces not ten pieces right because I have. A hundred more opportunities to get lucky and that's been found many many fields this idea of kind of just putting more work into the world and allowing yourself to get more lucky applying to more jobs asking more people out in dating. Like just yeah it's a craps you but when it's a craps you want more lottery tickets and the other thing that's been found which is really cool in a study of a whole bunch of painters. They're trying to predict what pain to the top and they're like the biggest predictor by far is how they present their work and the ones who don't make it present their work to the same place the same gallery over and over again and the ones you do they're like bumblebees they're just like constantly they're just like traveling everywhere you have to present their own present their own there like anyone will have them they go and occasionally they just stumble on some big break and that's pretty profound I think a lot of people make the mistake of just.
Like not exposing themselves widely enough to expose yourself widely can dramatically increase your chances of getting that lucky break I was going to say what do you think the lesson for people that are artists. I think it's probably a lot of similarity in that the mistake of the artist representing the same gallery over again is they already didn't get the break there so don't assume if you haven't gone to break there then. You're going to get it next year or two years of three years so kind of stagnating in a place where you're not rising or not where nothing much good is happening you got to kind of travel more widely to find to find a break I would say would be. Less than I take from it and traveling to places where you're more likely to get your break as well you know like.
Many artists who get the break were presenting in countries that are known for discovering artists and similarly many computer computer tech people are still got value that may be you know mistake going to play going to the place where you're more likely to get a break I think can be. A very valuable what was that thing you learn about the Mona Lisa. Oh yeah the Mona Lisa I realize I read a book that is smile that the Mona Lisa was just an ordinary painting but then there was like. This heist and.
Everybody's trying to understand what happened why the Mona Lisa was stolen and it was like a worldwide phenomenon people that people are probably constantly it's all in it people that JP more and it turned out to be like a low level of loyal soul that it was underwhelming but the high. That was most famous painting so we are going to leave the best painting but it's not really it's just happened to be the painting that. I got stolen the right place at the right time the point of that is if you have a thousand paintings you have more chances for one of them to be stolen. It's pretty it's pretty clear that just working forever to get your one piece exactly right is not the best strategy having lots of pieces and allowing one of them to get lucky is a better strategy.
This is that famous photography class study that was done on this as well right that two groups were split up one was told to take as many photos as they wanted and then to submit one at the end the other group was still that they needed to work on one shot for the entirety of the course when you compare them at the end the group that's taken a tone of shots is just iterated so much more effectively and yet the learning by doing thing ties back into what we were saying before about working hard and deep one particular fields taking out it for a long time like the unsexy stuff what was that thing you looked at how to become a good athlete if you don't have the genetics to be one. It was just I was obsessed with sports I still have obsessed with sports but I was interested in I don't I know talent I didn't have no talent I rose to be an okay high school baseball player but I like I didn't have to it was also just in a county where there were no good baseball players the lofties. Yeah high school I was very far from being a great player but there's actually there's actually an interesting way to think about genetics the genetic edge in sports which is. Like if something really genetic there are lots of identical twins because identical twins share a hundred percent of their genes.
There's a lot more genetic identical twins that sport than even like fraternal twins or just normal brothers or sisters. So like basketball is dominated by identical twins I know it's a big Stanford basketball and we like soft for 10 years and then we recruit a set of identical twins and we're great again so the college twins first that was the low best wins it's like it works predictably it saves our our basketball program. In the course of basketball there it's just like dominated to a degree very very few other sports are by identical twins which shows that basketball is probably genetic in part because height is one of those genetic traits and each inch doubles your chances of making the NBA. Which is really cool like actually like a six one person has twice the chance of a six foot person and then a six nine person has twice the chance of a six eight person seven two person has twice the chance of seven one person like you're out of the distribution.
Well we don't know there's not a big enough sample for like eight but it probably does because I think like beyond a certain point it's usually a disease which massively lowers your coordination so like a thyroid problem people like where seven five or above frequently it's a thyroid a large thyroid issue that leads to that level growth. But then there's certain sports like they're not as exciting as being a basketball player but like a question is I'm in diving. I have a chart of that but where there's like never there never been identical twin Olympic diving in a question athletes and if you actually do the math it's pretty clear that that means that the genetics just aren't that big a factor in those ports. Which is why a lot of rich people kind of who had kids like me who want to be athletes are like yeah go to a question and you're going to call my great question.
I'm totally sure there's very little. We know we know that you're not built for athletics so let's try and we'll you into something. But yeah diving is actually one too because Adam Grant the professor at Wharton is written about popular books. He became a very talented diver and his coaches told him exactly what the data says that like if you're dirty he wants to be a basketball player and they're like you're not talented enough but you are very disciplined and hard working and passionate.
So diving is a good sport for you and the day I totally you know totally justifies that that's really where you want to play your energy. What did you learn about parenting that was so this was something I'd seen previously in a discussion and then to have it brought up in the dagger again was so interesting. Yeah so the overall effects of parents are like ways less than everybody thinks and the size of that are twins and adoptees. So if you like see you know identical twins adopted by different parents they turn out shot to be similar and then.
And then people adopted to the same parents and not that similar at all. But then so like so parents in general matter very little but there is evidence that the neighborhood you live in matters a lot. Basically they've looked at tax records and compared and people grow up in certain neighborhoods just do way better and they don't always clever math to prove that it's really cause cause at least certain neighborhoods are making a better and the big predictor that interestingly is the adults in that neighborhood so like adults that fill out a lot of census forms. If you like live on a block with adults that live a lot of census forms your kids way more likely to have good outcomes and you're kind of like what the hell is that like that's the randomest thing in the world is basically like good responsible adults.
Similarly if girls move to neighborhoods with lots of female scientists they're more likely to become scientists themselves. So like what lessons I took from the data is even outsourced parenting a little bit like when you tell your kids to do something they're just going to probably rebel against you because you know a lot of you'll think their parents are like. The school people on the planet. But your friends they're going to think they're pretty cool probably like if I think of my parents friends all them like yeah those are you know their parents right.
My dad was pathetic and the biggest loser and whatever but his friends are always like yeah they're awesome so basically just got a pick friends that you want your kids to turn out to be like and put them in front of your kids and then you may be shocked by how much your impact. These people are having on your kids. It's so interesting the fact that the people that you live next door to a potentially gonna have a bigger impact on your children than you do. Yeah yeah yeah it's weird it's wild not even their kids right not even that it's not don't worry about oh well such and such is sun is a little bit of a naughty boy and he doesn't really listen to class and it's like yeah but his dad's cool as fucking he's a millionaire.
You're like just let little tini go and play with him a lot. Yeah reminds me of I don't know if you saw the book if you read the book Rich Dad Poor Dad. Yeah by Robert Kiyosaki. Yeah yeah that's exactly that.
That his life was transformed by beating this guy who he thought was way cooler than his dad. Could it not be like cool dad uncool dad that might just be it. Yeah yeah yeah and then like that transformed his life instead of kind of his traditional narrow path that he thought he was supposed to take of getting a lot of college degrees and like working for the government he wanted to become an entrepreneur like his rich dad his friends dad so I didn't think about that. What about if his dad had been the rich dad and his friends had been the poor dad Robert would have probably grown up to be poor because he would have listened to the wrong person.
Yeah yeah yeah it's interesting to think about it. Yeah I don't know it's it can exaggerate the extent that you know some parents definitely do have big impact on their kids and sometimes kids do think their parents are really cool but I think that I think the parents are polarizing figures for kids whereas like the neighbors tend to be universally kind of cool. Like now even looking back on it like the parents in my neighborhood who I know weren't cool like when I was a kid I thought they were really cool and cooler than my dad. Like one guy just to show off he wasn't a good basketball player but he just like constantly drilling the ball between his legs and doing like weird booze and I'm like now looking back on like that guy was pathetic like trying to impress 10 year olds with his terrible basketball moves but the time I'm like this guy's amazing that's why I want to be a basketball player because I grew up near this guy.
It's the lame basketball guy what was it what was that thing about the odds of becoming a celebrity. Yeah just that there are more independent artists in the top 1% of earners than I would have guessed because it does offer this local monopoly and trying to become an independent like trying to be a podcast host or a writer things like that. If you're young and you're willing to do the things that hack your hack luck your advantage maybe not a crazy hat so yeah. So that's the insta video it's ladies and gentlemen if people want to keep up to date with what it is that you're doing where should they go.
Well definitely but I don't trust your gut and then my website is set that's D.com. I love it man I appreciate your work I like the fact that someone who has the data science chops to be able to ask all of the big questions that we want has decided to go and troll through whatever 1000 academic papers and a ton of data to do it. The books brilliant everyone should go and check it out will be linked in the show notes below and looking forward to seeing what you do next. Thanks Chris.