Correlation Between Social Skills and Income?

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How should I assess my social skills?

Excellent social skills here. I go out to dinner with the VPs, the girlfriends family and can go to a bar and chat up the girls pretty.

Doesn't mean I enjoy it, nor that it's easy.

It's a game and as you move through life experiencing different partners, you recognize different styles and rules. It just takes a bit of time to recognize these unwritten rules, and simple observation reveals them once you're in the setting (you'll appear shy at first as your wondering what is the right food to order, position to sit in and who you need to talk to and laugh with). Anyone can play by the rules and appear to be successful.

Doesn't make it easy. You have the rule book constantly running in your mind, with the list of anecdotes and jokes which make you seem funny and interesting. But hell, it's not you and it gets tiring.

Does knowing the rules help make you successful? Hell yes. Walk into a meeting, a few minutes late and next to last to arrive - do you take the last seat knowing that the CTO is always late (and it's the seat at the head of the table which is vacant)?

It really is a catch 22. You can't know the rules without being the slight bit successful at the rules in order to get the money to get into the situations where you need to know the rules.

However, you build and slowly work your way up. Don't chat up the prettiest girl at the bar with 3-4 guys surrounding her. You'll learn nothing but depression. Find the one or two sitting alone (and they're the bigger ones, but dressed nicely) and just go and say hi. No game playing, as they're just as nervous as anyone else (honestly worse because women have self-esteem issues especially when there is a physical trait which moves them to the extremes of the bell curve) so are generally glad someone is talking to them (unless they're just bitchy, but then you have fun teasing them)

Ultimately: You need to have the ability to socially interact in all but the most extreme situations (e.g. silver spoon), and in order to become successful (e.g. not an artist/writer) and achieve a decently high income ($60,000+). It's tiring, tough but ultimately is worth it to have an additional set of skills in your back pocket.

Like learning how to fight - you're going to get hit and get hurt. But when the time comes, you know how to throw a punch or two.

A guy I work with is of the opinion that if they did a scientific study to track people and see if social skills is related to success and prosperity, you'd find a very prominent correlation. To his knowledge, no such study has been done. However, in his experience, all the party guys he knew in college are doing better than he is. He may be smarter, but their social connections got them more opportunities to forge ahead.

Of the 48 people who have so far voted in a category 15 have high/above average income, ( which is just under a third, about 30% ), 3 have an average income, 10 have a low income, 13 are unemployed, and 7 are students.

Out of the 48 votes so far exactly 10 people declare having good-excellent social skills, of whom 5 are highly paid, 3 unemployed, and 2 students ( which is weird ). 23 people declare having adequate social skills, of whom 6 are highly paid, 1 average paid, 7 below average, and 4 unemployed. And of the 15 who describe themselves as having poor social skills, 4 are high paid, 2 average, 3 low paid, and 6 unemployed.

Exactly a third of the higher paid people have, ( according to them ), good-excellent social skills, but another 6 of the higher paid say that they have only adequate social skills, and a further 4 that they have poor social skills. This fits perfectly with the finding on the other poll, ( in Love and Dating ), that there is no correlation between sexual/relationship success and above average income. It seems that there are high-paying jobs in which social skills are largely irrelevant.

What is interesting is that in the low to average paid jobs there is noone with good-excellent social skills. Only three people have voted to say that they have an average income in fact. And none of these three have good-excellent social skills. ...

I can understand that none of the 10 in low paid jobs say that they have good social skills, but how is it that in the average income bracket noone at all so far has good social skills? Is it because those with good social skills find low-average paid jobs not sufficiently remunerative for the amount of effort they put into performing well socially, or what? ...

The votes in the unemployed category, 3 with good-excellent social skills, 4 with adequate, and 6 with poor social skills, make me think that the above explanation might be true. ... Is it possible that some/many people with good-excellent social skills may have acquired them at the expense of specialist knowledge/technical skills, poured a lot of their energy and intelligence into learning social skills, only to find that the energy required to maintain them in a working environment is beyond them, at the same time as finding most low-average paid jobs too utterly boring to tolerate?

Interestingly none of the 7 students who have voted so far describe themselves as having poor social skills.
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Most of the high paying people I know (so this is 100% biased) are in the high tech field. Not a lot of them make their money from socializing (e.g. sales, marketing, running events). It's very easy to become specialized and gravitate towards the sciences which can yield a substantial paycheck and require little social skills.



Using intelligence and drive..

Smart & drive - you will go far (pretty self explanatory)
Drive - you will go far (start you own business, restaurant, etc. Many 1st wave immigrants do this)
Smart & no drive - you'll wind up in a field which makes you happy (e.g. See MENSA membership rolls)
No drive - Uhh... Only by luck will you wind up with a higher than average paycheck.

The variation of this game is "smart/lazy"



I think social skills are a factor in being successful, like intelligence and drive. If a person is socially inept, of low intelligence, has no drive, lives in a 3rd world country, etc. That person won't win any prizes. However, a person of high social skills (a talent) and no interest in anything else besides being comfortable and happy won't feel the need (assuming lack of drive) to pursue a difficult career except when forced. Once they get into their initial 2-3 jobs, they establish what their level of comfort versus effort is and enjoy the ride.



Ah kids, what do they know No, they look at their peers and most humans in school (up until about 22) are awkward and still trying to find their place.

Above average pay - poor social skills.

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Thats describes me.