Great post Steve, thank you
!! I understand and agree with the principles involved but I'm still left wondering if there's some career paths which suffer from such low social value that they will never create abundance for a contributer, no matter how much social value they may generate.
For example - I'm currently working as an illustrator, it's an over saturated market because the work itself provides high personal value and so a lot of people choose it as a career. Because of this over-saturation there are illustrators out there who provide a high amount of social value, such as matte painters for big movie studios, people who write and illustrate books, etc, but they are not compensated very well because there's so many other contributers out there with the same skills making similar contributions.
The sheer volume of contributers lowers the social value of the contribution. This is what makes me think that some fields have a "glass ceiling" of income that can be earned simply because of the high volume of contributers in that field??
Dave Kaminski - Yes I think you should definately ignore the opinions of those who scoff at your efforts, most people scoff out of fear - the fear that you'll prove them wrong and actually do something worthwhile with your life while also doing something you love, something they only dream about because they're too afraid to take action themselves. I think your idea is very honorable and worthwhile and you should definately follow your heart!