I Agree with Professor Galloway
Robinhood is a gambling app that will have a net negative effect on young men in the long run.
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Scott Galloway is getting blasted on Twitter this morning by millennials and Gen Zs.
He did an interview on MSNBC where he gave his insight on the Robinhood fiasco. Watch it for yourself.
Here’s my view.
Why Millennials are Mad at Boomers
Millennials and Gen Zs are mad, and they should be. Boomers control 53% of the wealth in our country. Millennials, despite being the largest population in the country, control 5%.
Think about that. 5% of the countries wealth is controlled by millennials. Take a second to think about how that happens.
Young people have been getting fucked over in our country for the last 30 years.
Boomers say dumb shit like “well if you would move out of your parents basement and get a job, maybe you would get somewhere in life.”
Meanwhile, tuition rates have increased something like 200% year over year in comparison to salaries.
We can see these same patterns in…
mortgage rates
the cost of food
the cost of transportation
basically… the cost of being a person and staying alive
So if you catch a boomer saying something dumb like “millennials are lazy”, remember that millennials work more hours and make less money with worse health insurance and worse retirement plans than boomers did. Basically, boomers should stfu.
To throw some extra salt in the wound, boomers played the majority role in collapsing the economy in 2008. As punishment for their crimes, they were able to keep all of their bank bonuses and totally avoided prison time. Who do you think got stuck with the bill? Millennials.
But other than that, it’s a completely fair system.
Why $GME is a Rally Cry for Millennials
When when a group of young people made millions of dollars by sticking it to a group of predatory hedge fund managers, you can bet there was excitement around it. Millennials are going to be ruling this country soon, and it’s one of the first times we have ever seen the communication networks of social media create an organized coalition in a way that took power and money away from the rich boomers, and put it into the pockets of every day Americans.
Millennials found an opening. They out researched, out organized, and out maneuvered a pack of billionaire hedge fund managers, and they won. That has never happened before.
Great, so with that context, let’s dive into Scott Galloway’s interview.
Where Scott Galloway Fucked Up
When Scott Galloway gets on MSNBC and starts talking about things like “personal growth” and “not wasting your time in front of the computer screen”, it feels like another boomer telling us how we should be living our lives.
This is the same nonsense millennials have been hearing for years. Meanwhile, our computer screens are the only real tools we have to advance ourselves in the current economy.
One of the funniest quotes I’ve heard about this is…
“Video games didn’t make young people reckless and radicalized. After 20 years of gaming, we discovered that Fox News viewers (boomers) were more disillusioned than young people playing video games.”
It’s funny but it’s also sad.
Regardless, Twitter has not been responding nicely to Scott Galloway’s remarks and as usual, the responses and memes are hysterical.
and my personal favorite…
To Scott Galloway’s Point
If these people took a few moments to gather their emotions and stop rage tweeting, here’s what they would see.
Day trading is a terrible way to make money - In fact, the data clearly says that the more time you spend managing your stocks, the less money you make. In fact, 80% of day traders lose their money.
Robinhood is a gamified app - Some of the smartest people in the world got together to figure out how to create triggers and feedback loops that keep you coming back to the app over and over again. Have you ever had a Robinhood account? You can’t stop checking it. The reality is that this app is addictive.
Addictive apps cause depression - Do we really need to have this conversation again? These apps are designed to make you feel like everyone else around you is doing better than you are. This is a built in hierarchy structure that deliberately invites status roles into the app. No matter how well you do, you’re never at the top of the pecking order. We’ve seen this movie already with Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and social hierarchy structures in general. Social based apps and increased screen time directly correlate to depression. We all agree on this right?
Who will come out of this ahead? - Ten years from now, who do you think will be better off? Young people who spend hours day trading on Robinhood or young people that learned life skills such as relationship building, fitness, and business? (And before you start flipping out about day trading being a skill, let me remind you that the S&P500 has outperformed hedge funds year over year for 30 years and it’s not even close. So if day trading is a skill, most people really suck at it.)
In Conclusion
Scott Galloway is right.
The problem is he came off like an old guy that was lecturing young people about the harmful effects of computers. He used language like “the loss of capital is in losing young men” and in my view, it came across as stuffy and outdated.
But on a long enough timeline, we all know that Scott Galloway will be proven right.
Robinhood and day trading is only going to foster gambling addictions, create dopamine and serotonin feedback loops, and create a generation of young men who are poorly equipped for life.
Side note** Yes - I said young MEN, because almost 80% of day traders are men. So I don’t wanna hear any nonsense or get a flood of DM’s about me “mansplaining” because I am stating facts.
(source)
I love the internet. In my view, understanding the internet is way more lucrative than college. I am a millennial who has made myself rich by building internet businesses. I’m not taking a side here.
My point is that Robinhood is an addictive app that promotes gambling behavior with built in social feedback loops that makes gambling feel good.
What could possibly go wrong?
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