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Ben Carlson’s column today is titled “The Ovarian Lottery”. Where and when you were born has a whole lot to do with how your life turns out. You could be capable of becoming a great artist, but if you were born female for most of human history you wouldn’t be able to reach your potential. Born a serf in medieval Europe? You were going to stay a serf. Sure, hard work helps, but if your particular talent isn’t in demand, it only helps so much. Just ask the North Carolina furniture and textile workers laid off after NAFTA.
He also has a quote from Nick Maggiulli: “If you had invested from 1960-1980 and beaten the market by 5% each year, you would have made less money than if you had invested from 1980-2000 and underperformed the market by 5% a year. Sometimes, when you start investing can be more important than anything else”. When you start drawing down also matters, of course.
I got lucky: I was born to a middle class family in England right after WWII. That meant adequate food, excellent (free) education and good (free) medical care, plus getting into the tech business when it was just taking off. Being born in, say, North Korea at the same time would have been a very different story.
Interesting you mention North Korea. My father in-law (97) along with hisb11 siblings were all born in North Korea. After war broke out in 1950 they fled south. In the mid to late 70’s they immigrated to the US (Hawaii to be exact), and all have had a very good life since. I’ve been married (happily), to my bride (who was born in South Korea) for 39 years.
Totally agree. So many factors go into having a happy and healthy life. Having good luck definitely help, sometime a lot. We still control how we respond to what get thrown to our life.
Thank you, Ms. Wilhelm, for this article. I am heartened by it because my conviction is that understanding the role of luck, i.e., fate, in life is a key foundation of wisdom. I am convinced also that the deeper one’s understanding of how “the ovarian lottery” (though I might use a broader term) works, the more compassion is possible, both for self and others.
Here’s a complementary link I came across the other day, if you care to check it out. I think I got it from Rob Berger’s weekly email.
https://seths.blog/2025/07/seeing-the-lottery/
I’d like to note, too, that one aspect of the “lottery” that could use more appreciation is the aspect of timing, i.e., the era in which we were born.
(Brought to mind is a fantastic book, in general and with regard to considering luck and fate, “Destiny of the Republic” about the fate of one of the most interesting and little-known U.S. presidents, James Garfield, and the state of 19th century medicine, among other things.)
Separately, it seems to me that the aphorism about “making one’s own luck” is kinda sorta useful, as it can be a spur to effort and can allow some patting of one’s own back after success in an endeavor. On the other hand, it can’t be taken as a literal truth because luck, by definition, is something that is beyond our control rather than something we create.
Also, more than passing acceptance of an idea like “you make your own luck” allows for some spectacular cherry picking of reality. It allows, too, for condescension or scorn toward others who we might like to consider lazy or stupid or otherwise less worthy when we assume a great deal but actually know precious little about the myriad causes of their circumstances and capacities, or lack thereof. Or for a completely different sort of example, we might consider the recent history of a person we all admire, Jonathan Clements.
Thanks for the link. I especially liked “Don’t give lottery winners more credit than they deserve.”
I agree with you about timing. I got a job in tech at a time when the company hiring me was looking for people with a degree in any subject who could do well on their aptitude test. I would not get that job today.