QuoteProject
It is those who are successful, in other words, who are most likely to be given the kinds of special opportunities that lead to further success. It’s the rich who get the biggest tax breaks. It’s the best students who get the best teaching and most attention. And it’s the biggest nine- and ten-year-olds who get the most coaching and practice. Success is the result of what sociologists like to call “accumulative advantage.
Malcolm Gladwell
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Success often breeds more success through advantages and opportunities.

In this quote, Malcolm Gladwell discusses the concept of 'accumulative advantage,' suggesting that individuals who achieve success are more likely to receive additional opportunities that further enhance their success. This creates a cycle where those already successful gain more resources, support, and advantages, while those who are less successful have fewer opportunities to advance, highlighting the social dynamics that contribute to inequality.

Themes

SuccessOpportunityAdvantageInequalityEducation

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be used in a panel discussion about educational inequality and the importance of providing equal opportunities for all students.

More from Malcolm Gladwell

No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.
Malcolm GladwellRead
People are in one of two states in a relationship,” Gottman went on. “The first is what I call positive sentiment override, where positive emotion overrides irritability. It’s like a buffer. Their spouse will do something bad, and they’ll say, ‘Oh, he’s just in a crummy mood.’ Or they can be in negative sentiment override, so that even a relatively neutral thing that a partner says gets perceived as negative.
Malcolm GladwellRead
The people at the top don't work just harder or even much harder than everyone else. They work much, much harder.
Malcolm GladwellRead
Achievement is talent plus preparation. The problem with this view is that the closer psychologists look at the careers of the gifted, the smaller the role innate talent seems to play and the bigger the role preparation seems to play.
Malcolm GladwellRead
When I go to my health club, and it's in the basement, you have to take the elevator down. And this drives me crazy. Why can't there be a stairway? At least make it as easy to exercise as it is to not exercise. It's in society's interest for me to take the stairs.
Malcolm GladwellRead
Hard work is a prison sentence only if it does not have meaning.
Malcolm GladwellRead

Similar quotes

Success consists of getting up just one more time than you fall.
Oliver GoldsmithRead
I played in front of every conceivable audience you could face: an all-black audience, all-white, firemen's fairs, policemen's balls, in front of supermarkets, bar mitzvahs, weddings, drive-in theaters. I'd seen it all before I ever walked into a recording studio.
Bruce SpringsteenRead
Blessed is he who has found his work; let him ask no other blessedness.
Thomas CarlyleRead
There never has been a man in the game who could put mind and muscle together quicker and with better judgment than Robinson.
Branch RickeyRead
The same instincts that make us good students can make us lousy entrepreneurs.
Reid HoffmanRead
The secret of success is learning how to use pain and pleasure instead of having pain and pleasure use you. If you do that, you're in control of your life. If you don't, life controls you.
Tony RobbinsRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.

Quote by Malcolm Gladwell | QuoteProject