how much can you make and misc thoughts

[snakehead]

many times it has been asked, how much can you make playing poker? a friend who has been playing around the 80-160 level for over 10 years and I were discussing this the other day, and here is what we came up with:

80-160 to 150-300: $250,000-500,000/yr

30-60 to 40-80: $100,000+/yr

online, playing no higher than 30-60: $200,000/yr

these are subjective estimates based on our personal experience and knowledge of other players' results. ymmv. I would be interested in whether others agree or disagree.

I have no idea what my iq is, but I doubt I would ever make it onto one of david's lists. despite that, I have become somewhat succsessful at the 100-200 level. often players discuss the differences between the level they are playing and higher levels, whether they be 5-10 to 20-40 or 100-200 to 400-800 (or higher). usually, they think that the game is played the same but the higher limit players just have more money or were lucky in building a bankroll large enough to play that high.

I think this is wrong, and the reason applies to myself as well as to others. successful higher limit players play better than those at lower limits, and the most important skills they posess is hand reading. this allows them to make better decisions, which ties in directly to david's point about superior reasoning. decision-making is the real difference.

I think the real reason for david's list is to say, nah nah na nah nah, we're better than you are. but from my reading of his materials and my limited conversations with him, I think david is one of the most intelligent people I have ever met, so his list is probably right on.