Earning a Living Playing Poker

This thread in Quora about what it’s like to earn a living by gambling and playing poker is fascinating. From someone who plays on Stars and Full Tilt named Jeff Myerson:

Poker is exotic. It got me a weird sort of recognition and popularity in school. I went to Westlake, an upper-crusty, white bread, super wealthy public school. Popularity at Westlake is a function of how much you flaunt your wealth, how many AP classes you are taking, and how good-looking you are. By senior year I was playing $3/$6 and $5/$10 no-limit, and had a bankroll of $100,000. I drove a ’98 Camry and wore hand-me-downs, but I found ways to backdoor my self-made wealth into conversations. Eventually it percolated through my class that I was “that poker guy”.

Myerson says he got into poker after years of playing Magic: The Gathering competitively.

Another player says as a reminder: “All that said, you have to love poker in order to play 6–18 hours a day for a varying paycheck (which can and will be negative at times).”

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