I mean, pretty much this:

Are you making enough money that you can use those winnings to cover a significant portion (or all) of your living expenses? You're a pro.

Are you losing money, enough that it has a material, detrimental impact on your quality of life, but you keep coming back and playing at those stakes anyway? You're a degen.

Are you winning enough that you COULD support yourself, but then immediately turning around and blowing those winnings in the pit? You're a pro, AND a degen.

El Diesel is the epitome of a poker pro.

You must make close to 24/hr in poker to be so impacted by my comment. My point is at 24/hr you're a winning player but you're not that good relative to top tier players - at 24/hr say realistically 30 hours a week that's 720/week in income, 2800/mo, 34k or so a year. Making 34k/yr is considered good? That's poverty level for most.

Someone doesn't have to be a pro, or make enough money to support themselves to be considered a good player. You guys are so arrogant and you just want to put others down. Do you realize that just to break even at poker, you have to be considerably better than the average player? Also, your math isn't so good - $24/hour, 30 hours per week would be over $37k per year. Personally I've never made more than $37k per year at anything, and I have never lived in poverty. Most people have what I would call "degen" habits in their non-gambling lives. They waste tons of money on drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, fast food, unneeded luxury items that they then want to replace after a few years, etc. Except for in the most expensive cities in the US, $37k per year is more than I personally need to live comfortably. If you make a lot more than that playing poker, good for you, I imagine you're an excellent poker player. It's still stupid to chime in (for no reason relevant to the discussion) that someone who beats poker for a very significant amount "isn't very good at poker".

It’s all relative. Not everyone has access to the same games either. Some casinos or card rooms only spread 1/2 for example.

$24/hr. could be an absolute crusher in some rooms. But this thread was supposed to be about whether those $24/hr. winners are degens.

There are many different kinds of pros - online grinders, live grinders, people who have leveraged poker celebrity into a career, people who make significant income from poker related activities like training sites, etc.

Degens are all pretty much the same, and once you see the degen story happen a few times it stops being fascinating or funny and becomes sad. (The Adam Sandler movie Uncut Gems is a movie about degenerate gambling; it's not funny or fascinating or even interesting. It's just a brutal look at a guy who thinks it matters what happens with his next bet when the reality is it doesn't matter because he'll eventually end up how he ends up regardless of how many "next bets" he wins.)

Uncut Gems was sad, but I thought it was also both funny and interesting. I'd recommend the film to everyone.

Sorry I didn't break out a calculator for the exact figure buddy - good for you. My whole initial point was on live winrates - 24/hr means you can improve your game significantly or you're playing too low of a stake. Whether you want to call that being good or not that's your choice, but by professional standard it's not. Furthermore I don't know how you live on 37k - maybe I could pull it off if I was a single guy renting with a buddy or in my parents house eating scraps, but for most that's poverty level living. Hell I'm in CT and even 100k for a family of 4 barely makes a nice lifestyle.

a pro can pretend to degen. But a degen can not pretend to pro.

Lol at thinking the default of financial success is being able to comfortably support a family of 4. You've basically just said that $25k is enough to (barely) support one person in a "nice lifestyle" in one of the most expensive states in the country.

You don't take 100k and divide it by 4 - I would still need a home regardless of kids, so even for a couple with no kids I would still need at least 80-100k to live a reasonable lifestyle. Either way it doesn't matter - some parts of the country are cheaper than others. My only point is we should all strive to be great in whatever we're doing - if you're going to be a poker pro then try to be elite. Tom Brady is in the NFL - making it to the NFL alone is an elite accomplishment, yet he wants to be the best in the NFL and potentially all time. Try to be the Tom Brady at whatever you're doing, whether that's work,relationships,health,etc. If you don't want to that's fine, you'll pay the price struggling in other respects, but that's not the life I want to lead.

There was a thread of a guy who moved out to Thailand. He was living in an apartment and for a living was playing $.10/.25nl on Pokerstars. He would average making like $300 to $400 a month but made a comfortable living cause of price differences. Technically he was making a living as a poker pro.

He's engaged in a consistent, long-term, business with the expectation and realization of substantial self-supporting profit. Pro: says a Vegas accountant.

Jesus christ where the f do u live?? I pay 37k a year in taxes in NJ lol

Nice brag.

Good summary, except that the winning/losing activity need not be poker, it can be gambling generally, c.f. PSUMike, by all accounts a decent poker player but a poor gambler ?

BRM steady graph

That works fine if your plan is to stay in Thailand for your whole life, but if something doesn't work out and you want to live back in the US you're ****ed.

WTF do you know me IRL?

Every pro is a degen

But not every degen is a pro

Also pros tend to be life degens

But degens tend to be life pros

I'd say 3 of these 4 are correct.

The size of his roll.