I know that some think this is just some cold hard straight talk but this style of individualistic thinking lacks empathy. And more practically, it’s a trap.

In context, the “doing things” and “opportunities” that we’re talking about are jobs, careers. So by promoting the idea that one must work harder or longer to get or keep a career that they’ve already built sounds like a path to opt-in servitude.

In hiring, we pass laws to prevent abuses. In many countries and soon a few states, being asked to work outside of work hours is considered an abuse. Expecting that someone does work related activity outside of work hours is something I would actually consider regulating out of the application process!

Of course life isn't fair. But here the result is that companies will ignore potentially great candidates which dedicate all their programming time to their job and instead consider candidates which may be not just worse programmers, but also are more interested in their hobbies (or padding their CV) that doing their job.

I'm saying this as somebody who most of the time has some side project going on.

“Fair” is one thing, “systemically impossible to even approach fair” is another.

For example, you can’t “conscious long-term effort” your way out of being stop and frisked by cops because you were walking while black.

This setup isn’t even good for employers. Having your job as your hobby doesn’t automatically make you better at your job.