Turns out that business students from one of the best American schools are alienated
from reality to the point where they think that ordinary American workers,
not only make six figure salaries on average but make close to $1 million.
So, that's what one professor at Wharton Business school at Penn figured
out after asking her students about it.
This is Nina Strominjure.
And so, she disclosed in a series of tweets that she had asked Wharton
students what they thought the average American worker makes per year.
And a whopping 25% of them, a quarter of them thought it was over six figures.
One of them thought it was $800,000.
I mean that's student, I don't know what planet the students living in but anyway.
Really not sure what to make of this, the real number is 45,000.
And by the way, just to get a little more specific based on data that's been
collected by the Social Security administration.
They put the average US annual wage last year at $53,383 and
the median wage at $34,612.
In the fourth quarter, the Labor Department said median weekly
earnings were $1010 or an annualized $52,520.
So, I just wanted to give you the specifics, they're nowhere near $800,000.
Also nowhere near six figures, Jank.
>> Yeah, so look there's a lot of numbers
there I if you wanna know what the real number is.
So the one that says that's the average takes into account the enormously wealthy
when it does the accounting because that's what would give you the average.
The median tells you, okay, half the country is under this and
half the country's over this.
And that's $34,612.
Which is quite a distance from $800,000.
Now the reason and so Anna's right, so I went to Penn,
I specifically went to Wharton undergrad.
I know our reputation is already destroyed because Trump went there.
So, I guess burn the diploma or something is useless.
I mean look obviously he got in there because of nepotism but
that is connected to this story.
Because tons and tons of students about 35% last count not
specifically of Panama of the ivies or legacy admissions.
That means papa went there.
>> Or mama went there mums went there.
And they got in because of that, not because they're good students flat out.
And by the way, being an alumni is not good enough,
you have to be an alumni that donates to pen.
Those are stone cold facts denying them would be hilarious, right?
So you can bribe yourself into these schools.
I know I went there, it was filled to the rim was super rich kids.
It turns out according to the New York times data that's quoted in another tweet,
the median family income of a student at Penn is $195,000.
But honestly I'm surprised it's that low.
So for them they see it from their perspective, well the average,
I don't know, Mama and Papa's friends are all millionaires.
So I don't know, I guess the average,
well I get that the average family is a little bit lower than moms and papa.
But so I guess instead of being millionaires,
they make hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Of course they genuinely believe that that's been their only experience.
Do you think they hang out with poor people, don't they?
They genuinely have no idea what the average American is going for.
And you know what, those are the same people who
are gonna become politicians and reporters and cable news anchors.
And they're gonna carry that bias with them all the way through.
>> I think you're absolutely right about that.
I really do think that the legacy students are definitely the ones who
are more predisposed to having a skewed view of what income is in America.
I have another theory as well, which I'll get to in just a second, but before I do,
I wanna give the perspective of one other professor who responded to that thread.
Catherine Martinez is her name, let's go to graphic six here.
Where she says one of my students asked me,
if $250,000 was an okay salary for a 25 year old.
And then at that point I went to the corner,
wrapped myself up in the fetal position and rocked back and forth.
That is incredibly depressing.
I'm assuming that this student was offered that salary and was like, I don't know,
is this good money.
But Jake, the other thing I wanted to bring up is again,
I think that your theory that is the biggest factor.
There's no question, people who live in an alternate reality because of the privilege
and wealth that they've grown up with.
But, I also remember being a college student not too long ago before I actually
experienced reality, okay.
And, I don't think all students fall under this category, but think about
how we were told over and over and over again, all you need this is America.
We've got the American dream.
All you have to do is work hard, get an education, and
then as soon as you graduate and work, for a few months, you'll be a millionaire.
All the people who are poor are lazy, that's why they're not Millionaires.
So I like when you grow up with that lie, with those myths and
you're currently a college student.
I mean, I don't think that far fetched to have unreasonable expectations of
what the job market really is, once you're out of college.
>> Yeah, and who brought you that mythology that America is a meritocracy.
There's still elements of that, I'm not a complete cynic at all, right.
>> But that.
>> Why?
>> Why do they have the myth of meritocracy is if that's the only thing
that gets you wealth and if you don't have wealth, it's because you didn't merit it.
It's because the people in power with all the wealth created that myth,
to make themselves look fantastic and to make you look inferior.
If you're not already rich, I guess you didn't merit it
wrote the handmaidens of the wealthy that run our media.
And so that's why it's in an average college students head to,
cuz they grew up on that corporate media that told them this mythology.
So, but back to pen and overall though,
I mean, look you can even do it with reporters.
So, and I do often do this, I ask people, hey,
what do you think is the salary of someone who earns the federal minimum wage today?
What's their yearly salary?
They have no idea, they've never thought about it.
I bet you that 50% of reporters, national reporters esteemed,
people who are held in with great status etc in New York times, etc.
All of them are gonna like run of the mill.
I'm talking about the top reporters in the country,
I guarantee you half of them wouldn't get within, 2X or
4X of what the actual yearly salary is for the federal minimum wage.
You watched the young Turks have said 100 times it's $15,000,
there's no way they know that.
They don't know that.
I guarantee you ask cable news anchors,
all of the minimum wage I know it's really low, I know some people complain about it.
I had 50,000, 35,000 I mean and then you tell him 15,000.
No, how can anybody live on that, that's a weekend in Vegas.
That's their way of looking at the world.