Why first born rules the world?

We may somehow sense through our life experience, be it from newspaper, friends, social life, or even intuition that first born children tend to have better quality of life (financially, career wise, or happiness). I am not saying this as an absolute claim that there is no case where non-first born children are more successful than first born children. Examples of this case are abundant, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Lee Kuan Yew and Isaac Newton. I am the first born in my family. I experience (objectively), if not feel (subjectively), that as the first born I outsmart my younger siblings. Not only that I outsmart, but I also mature faster than all of them.
Here are few thoughts I have to rationalize why the above claim is valid:

1. Parenting skills and what first born has to learn himself. First born child must be born when their parents are at the youngest age. If we look to most traditions, particularly in the past, couple generally get married in the age of 20-27 and conceive first child also in between that age. Generally, couple who conceive their first child in that age lack parenting skills. I am 23 and I do not think I am ready to parent yet. First child is commonly parenting experiment. I understand that many parents prepare themselves prior to conceiving a child by either consulting to professionals or their own parents. However, experience counts a lot in parenting. Since parents most likely cannot provide that much help for first born in dealing with bullying, quest of life, and lots of questions wondering in children’s mind, first born child has to learn about them himself. Imagine that you are first born and your parents cannot help you much in how to deal with bully or specific stress you sustain out of mathematical figure at school, you have no one to turn into, therefore you have to struggle really hard to learn it yourself. This is why first born child generally has to work harder to adapt into their new environment. Parents (despite their education and maturity) can rarely provide comprehensive solution for a child to juggle with his daily activities.

2. Most importantly first born is generally conceived at the time his parents have to work hard for financial support. Besides, 20-27 is the age where most people are at the peak of their career or education. This means that parents most likely spend less time with their children. Some people may argue that some people are not concerned with money because those parents are inherently rich (parents whose parents are rich). My response is that how many segments of societies are rich? How many are not? Poor people always vastly outnumber rich people. This means that first born is generally conceived in a family where parents are concerned with financial condition. You may feel that you younger or youngest brother/sister is generally spoiled more than you are since your parents now have money and time to do that (assuming you differ 8-10 years in age from your brother/sister). Higher discipline and self-reliance are two features most first born are trained with as a direct consequence of such discrimination (first born usually does not get as much privilege, i.e. attention and toys, compared to his younger brother)

3. First born has to find answer on their own, while non-first born has better chance on getting those answers from his elder brother. Imagine you differ 4 years in age from your younger brother. Commonly, in elementary school, your brother has better chance of getting the answer of difficult math question from you. But, parents can give those answers because they have Ph.d in math.. That s not entirely true. You see... children can communicate better with other children. They speak the same language (sometimes you may even feel your professors are not speaking the “language” you understand). So, an elder brother can explain something better to his younger brother than their parents. There are also factors like familiarity to the said subject (probably his younger brother has done the same math question before), or proximity to the way teachers want students to study. The reason is probably the elder brother was once taught by the same teacher. Long story short, elder brother works harder to get the answer, while younger brother does not. This is a very important part of children cognitive development, where process counts... And the result becomes very a fruitful reward for the elder brother... It somehow creates sense of independency and self-esteem.

In a nutshell, first born has much more challenging playing field. These circumstances provide first born with more opportunities to learn “life” the hard way and on self-reliant fashion. Therefore, first born is generally more self-reliant, discipline, adaptive to environment, curious and mature. All of these are qualities of leaders, great scientists, and great philosophers. For reference read First born kid becomes CEO materials at http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/management/2007-09-03-ceo-birth_N.htm