Have you ever seen one of those posts on your socials from someone posing with a fancy car, or maybe even a jet. They’re not your parents’ age, they’re in their teens or twenties. And they’re saying that YOU TOO can make it big. They’ll even show you how!

And so the sales pitch begins for “how to” classes. It’s a scam as old as people’s yearning for what they don’t yet have. Deep down, most people know it’s a scam, but want to believe that this time is different. Think about it–if you knew of a way to make lots of money, would you spend your time trying to get paid to teach people, or doing whatever you did to make all that money in the first place?

A caped crusader of the interwebs has taken to pulling back the curtain on how the tacky displays of ostentation are staged to dupe and take advantage of the hopes of young people.

There is a great article in the New York Times here, but if you hit a paywall you can read a great summary here. Social media is a sketchy place where cynicism is definitely called for. It’s like the old joke about being a journalist, “if your mom says she loves you, check it out.”