Privilege and Inequality in Silicon Valley

Reminds me of the Stanford marshmallow experiment. Researchers offered children one marshmallow, but if they didn&#x27;t eat it, they promised a second marshmallow later. The children who had the &quot;willpower&quot; to wait for the second marshmallow did better in life on many measures.<p>An attempt to replicate this study found that childhood economic background was the best predictor of both willingness to wait for the second marshmallow and later life success. It wasn&#x27;t &quot;willpower&quot; per se - it was that some of those children had grown up believing, from experience, that a second marshmallow is never promised and you&#x27;re better off eating the first marshmallow now.

It’s much easier to take risks when you have a safety-net in case of failure. People who aren’t born into financial privilege more often have nothing or nobody to fall back on if there’s a problem. Just knowing that can impact whether or not you really chase your dream or play it safe.

This is the real inequality: the lack of knowledge, the mindset, and the lack of a backstop.

and then somebody tells you &quot;white privilege&quot;<p>congratz for skewing the odds, but I dont understand &quot;in Silicon Valley&quot; because it works like that almost everywhere