Some of my ancestors owned slaves, a lot of slaves actually came back after escaping because they were happier as slaves.

Sounds so easy

I feel sorry for the lucky ones only, for their world will coming crashing at some point. The ones who have strive without luck, will last, for they became something before they became something else before a poker pro

~200/400, depending. Mostly draw and split mixed.

+100 one of the best posts I've ever read on here which is so clearly legitimate too.

TL;DR = read the bold

OP, Maybe I'm one of your exceptions. I plan on playing poker to try to get 300K to invest and live off of my investments. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, but it seems like your whole premise is based on your opinion that a normal job is more secure than poker and that smart players won't make a future contribution to society. If I am understanding what you're saying, I have to disagree.

If you work a 9-5, most jobs won't let you pick just any company to invest your retirement money with. Usually you have to select group a, b, c, d, etc, of investment options that the company you work for has pre-approved. As a poker player I can invest my winnings in any way I choose. In other words, my investments will out perform the average 9-5er (hopefully) every time. By the time someone my age, doing what a normal job asks them to do to invest, can actually control their own money, my superior compounding interest will have left them in 20+ years of dust. On top of that, a poker pro can withdraw from their investments with no limit (besides monetary value) or penalty (unless it's in the investment contract) and answer to only themselves for it.

Also, as an employee, an average 9-5er has no control over some sudden disruptions to their job security. If the owner gets tired and sells, you may be fired. If the owner embezzles money, your job may be shut down. If the owner dies and their children run the company into the dirt, you could lose your job. If the owner dies and their children merge or sell the company, you could lose your job. If the owner decides to hire a younger less experienced person for less money, you could lose your job. The list goes on and on. There are lots of ways for other people to push someone out of their regular job, even if they are good at it. If an employer does something like that to push someone out before they can REALLY afford to retire, what will they do then? When older people get laid off it's usually harder for them to find work because the companies like to train a blank mind for life, so less return on training for the company equals fewer years and since you are usually "over qualified" they don't want to pay you that much when they could hire a new younger employee for 20+ years for less of a starting salary. You work in a booming industry OP, but most people's normal jobs don't allow them to just be hired by a competitor. Successfully self-employed people usually don't have to worry about things like that though. I am a recreational player, but would consider a pro self-employed.

I have a serious question OP: Why would you not trust someone to succeed at poker and instead put more faith in so many things beyond their control (like other people) to not go wrong? I think any engineer will tell you, usually the fewer parts an object has the less likely it is to have something go wrong. If I am in control of more parts then I have more control over my life. If some of the most important parts of my life (income) are being controlled by someone else … that's a recipe for possible disaster. I fail to see how giving someone else that much control is more secure.

As to the second part about not contributing to society: Do you seriously believe that people who are interested in making a contribution ever stop thinking about that just because they are playing poker? I'm constantly using things like that as my motivation. I don't think that I could stop thinking about it even if I wanted to. I believe that people that want to give back to society are people that can't turn that off. If you think poker is limiting them, then allow me to invite you to look at it like this: Poker is hastening their transition into what you are dreaming of, not slowing it down.

Now that I've said all of the nice stuff, let me tell you what I'm really thinking: I've learned a great deal of things about life from poker. I'm sure players of other games would say the same thing, but I doubt most of them learned things that so drastically shaped their decision making skills and possible future earnings away from the game. If people do what you advocate then they are even more of a slave to things far worse than variance. As long as I use proper bank-roll management I don't have to obsessively worry about going bankrupt. Unfortunately lots of people obsess about the company they work for going bankrupt, leaving them only some pittance and social security to live off of because someone else screwed up one thing that they themselves didn't have anything to do with. I would much rather have total control of all of those things myself than risk having an orphaned retirement plan. You put too much trust in other people handling young people's money and not enough trust in them. Not to mention that as an American I put no faith in the future of US currency. IMHO in 50 years this economy will probably implode due to lack of understanding that 97 Trillion dollars (currently) in just unfunded liabilities (medicare, social security, etc. that we owe to our own citizens) cannot be repaid [go fact check and scare yourself if you dare.] So, I hope you're not advocating a younger person take on a regular job to pay for these ridiculously inflated living costs when my generation already has to bear the brunt of social security with little to no expected return from it. People who work for a living are slaves. I don't work for money, money works for me. Poker isn't a job, it's a passion. I get payed to enjoy myself. I feel like I've been relatively nice, but you're comments have been very condescending IMO


Your ego alone makes you obviously bias just from the wording in your posts. If you can't see that then you are too jaded to have a logical conversation with in the first place. I know I'm bias, but my eyes are open and at least I know what color they are.

"You make your own decisions about me and make light of me. ... You guys misjudged the size of your 'container' and don't know how deep mine is." - Uchiha Itachi

Odd. His entire post was deleted as well as my response to him (guessing because I quoted the post).

This post made me sad.

Wow I'm glad I chose to use an @ symbol for the first time instead of quoting him. I went ahead and edited out the ending of my post just in case though.

So you think that in the corporate world, everyone is employed until the first time they get fired, and then it's all unemployment until retirement (because obviously experience is nothing but a liability to the employer)? And your investment plan is to outperform the market? Oh, boy, I hope you have Plan B.

Hello, I have been playing poker "professionally" for 8 years...The first 6 I was always broke needing money fronted with the promise of a check or a wire transfer on the way. I have probably made idk 80k through the years give or take. These last 2 years I have really improved I feel and it shows as I can safely cash out 2500 a month with relative ease. However this has all come at a cost.. The constant interactions with people who basically act like jerks just because we are playing for wow omg 20 bucks!! It takes a toll and I do feel like it affects the way I view people as a whole which I know is not exactly a good sample size or pool, Explaining to a woman/girl that you play online poker for a living becomes futile and even if you have a good month win 3k you still cant bring yourself to really want to tell people what you do for a living. Am i slave? Honestly yes...my only goal now is to get in the clear make enough to pay off my school debt and finish my bachelors. I know the education system is a joke,my mother is the Dean of Graduate studies of a large University with a Doctorates in education so yea I understand, but there is no other way. I am 32 with little work history, and no retirement. Can poker ever pay me back? Op has some good points but does fail to understand not everyone has his same values

Your attempt at reductio ad absurdum (trying to reduce my meaning to make it seem absurd) shouldn't have been wasted on an intentional misrepresentation of my words. It's a mistake to try to put words in my mouth. (I'll just quote the real ones back to you.)

I never said it's, “all unemployment until retirement,” but you knew that. Your weird inference about some insult that wasn't even there deserves no further typing other than to point out that I put "over qualified" in quotation marks.

Actually I had to work very hard at poker, but I am an economics savant. I don't care if you think of me as economics Rainman, but honestly, I think sitting through my father's lectures about macro- and micro-economics in the university auditorium before I was old enough to go to elementary school might have had something to do with it (maybe all that time growing up around him had something to do with it too) I didn't just outperform the market the two years I tried it; I obliterated it at almost 40% both years (and not those easy years where everybody made money.) When you start out using 33% of your life roll to dip your toe into the water with 6K, making 40% isn't that much. It takes money to make money.

Did you see the words I quoted at the bottom of the post you quoted?

They couldn't be more perfect right now.

Psylens, you say that "poker pros can withdraw from their investments with no limit or penalty."
Are you trying to say that corporate workers cannot do that?

I disagree with this post. People need to chill out in this thread. Way to materialistic.
The avg global citizen lives on 3 dollars a day. That's an hourly wage of about 40 cents.

Consider yourselfs lucky you were born in a semi decent country geeze

It depends on how the company is set up. Usually they cannot. The tax penalties are usually huge too. I've been told working for the federal govt. is basically the same as well. The Enron example jumps to mind.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/22/bu...n-tumbles.html

I see what your saying but your generalizing Im pretty serious about poker and I never drink at the table even in friendly home games, in fact i barely drink at all for fear that I may need to play, and as for other games like slots and black jack i cant mentally comprehend how other people play them i always feel like your supposed to lose at those games i realize it is generational and the machines and ideaology were different when they were first introduced...im only making this point because a lot of young wannbes and new pros that are serious take the same approach when starting out,, i dont see them drinking until going busto a couple of times and going through a divorce and owing huge debts, those are the players i see over indulging and not being able to control themselves

Employees are generally not required to contribute to 401k plans set up by their company (though if the company matches employee contributions, then it seems that it would generally be advisable). They could choose not to contribute anything to those plans. They could just invest money in a regular brokerage account. And they could set up IRAs to hold investments in if they choose to, which is something a poker pro could do also. There would generally be penalties for taking withdrawals from a traditional IRA early though.

being a slave may not be the worst thing, Thomas Jefferson had sex with his

To the best of my knowledge all of this is correct. I was under the impression that there were limits and restrictions on what you could put in your IRA though. (ex. I believed it wasn't wide open to buy anything or changed somehow depending on what type it is or where you got it.) I honestly thought more people had 401(k)s ... just looked that up. Thanks for the clarification Lego.

One thing i can say that I think OP is trying to say is no matter the age you cannot allow poker to consume your life, or base your self worth on your fluctuating swings(easier said than done) if poker is putting you in -EV life situations and hurting those around you then of course quit you may have a gambling problem, but you cant say someone should quit poker solely because they are losing players almost all rec players do have the dream of playing professionally, but they realize they are not yet good enough to quit their jobs so poker becomes a weekly hobby, and like all hobbies you will consistently loose money, but if its something you enjoy and can afford it dont worry about the monetary value, yeah these players may be driven by the illusion of one day playing against dwan or ivey, but as long as there not hurting anyone just let them be and not try and break their spirit, remember poker was once primarily a social game for the non-professional

Your posts are confusing me. Are you suggesting that employees cant choose what to do with their earnings.

Enron was sad. Employees were encouraged to invest in company shares, but it wasnt a requirment. Shares were rising all the time so employees believed it was a good option. But the big boys all pulled out before the company collapsed and the little guys were left to suffer big losses.

A sad story but they had the right to choose what to do with their money.

Most comapnies that pay $50k a year and under that offer 401k and retirement options dont contribute all that much themsleves they match maybe 1-5% of pay per year,,so a responsible player should put away about that much per year into a ira or cd...paying benefits out of pocket isnt as much as people think , but i am only refering to me individually im sure when you factor in kids and a spouse premiums can become insane

I've been around a minute, but not necessarily old school (RIP Doyle), and during my tenure I've seen several pros spiral/burn out. Not sure if they were up lifetime, but based on several of their stakes I presume not. The slavery is really with the make-up that they dig into.

I consider myself a serious rec (up lifetime, never on a stake, don't play fulltime, but continue to study the game to stay ahead, etc). A standard rec rides the highs (wins/cashes), and may cash out/temporarily quit when no longer fun...

A reg on a stake can't call it quits when it's no longer fun because they could be so deep in make up (5 or 6 figs in some cases). Think about that one sec... some decent recs that want a stake because of the coaching hit a DS and are in the same situation.

I probably didnt fully address OP, but this is where the slippery slope towards slavery begins. Only wise will escape and make money before it's too late.

lol brokers see us as fish in the finacial market, thats why they have all our money and people dont realize it until our debit card declines lol

I was actually talking more about getting to choose "when" to get their assets with the Enron thing. They had the right to choose what to do with their money before the bad news. They didn't have the ability to do anything during the collapse though. The company froze the assets at a terrible time for the employees. The article is pretty clear about the employees watching their stock price drop 94%. Obviously this is uncommon.

My main point about all of that was simply that if I invest my own money I don't have to worry about other people ruining my investment roll. -edit add on- The Enron guys went to prison (well one died before going, I just looked it up) for basically cheating their own employees.