Ask HN: Do you think career and family is either-or?

The problem you may run into though is stability. If your spouse isn't planning to work, then you need a stable source of income. When you're single it's far easier to cut back on your expenses than it is when you have kids. You can live in shared housing, eat spaghetti every day, wear the same two shirts for a couple years, and not really be any worse off for it. But you can't really avoid buying diapers.

So, entrepreneurship may be more difficult due to that. And really all outside-of-work ambitions do get tougher. I'd love to go for an advanced degree, and my wife even supports it "in theory". But the reality is, with two young kids at home, there's no time to maintain a stable job, take care of kids in a way that's remotely fair to my wife, and commit to a huge time suck like grad school. And frankly, I'd rather hang out with the kids. Though it did take a couple years to get to that point. There was absolutely regret on my side in the beginning, for quite a while.

Your original question was career vs family though. I think career is fine. As long as your job provides steady income and you're efficient with your time, I don't see any problem that kids would introduce in terms of advancing quickly in your career.

Also note, even entrepreneurship isn't impossible. I've got two friends that started a small consulting company around the same time they had kids. But they had a steady stream of clients at the start and always did good work, and also had enough savings to survive any hiccups they encountered, so it worked out for them. The "unicorn" startup may be more difficult though.

OP absolutely needs to have this discussion with his partner ... if they don't see eye to eye on what their goals are, then it puts the family at risk.

Also +1 for noting survivor bias.

In the talk with his partner, they need to confront head-on the issue that the whole entrepreneurship thing may not work out. Or worse, may be "on the verge of success" for year after year after year. Decide up front where to draw lines and what plan B might be.

I am 25 and I am managing two start ups (as VP and CEO), both of which will have multi-million exits in the next five years. In addition, I have a couple of side projects I am involved with, mostly company shares managed through my holding.

So, I'd say I am a career guy in the middle of that very career. And at this point, there is hardly any time for family things. I often don't have weekends, nor holidays. And I work like 14hs every day.

However, friends of mine are working for large enterprises, and they have a 40-50h week in middle-management. They also have their career but with time for family.

So I would say it really depends on the kind of career path someone's taking.

1. Entrepreneurs are doomed to "fall", to failure.

2. Being an entrepreneur requires much greater time than being an employee.

Both those are assumptions are true if you go traditional VC-funded startup route, for example.

But there are examples of entrepreneurs who have built companies around a 40-hour work week, and around making money, instead of "5 billion dollar valuation or bust." (VC-funded companies usually go bust, as it turns out.) See https://stackingthebricks.com/how-do-you-create-a-product-pe... for some suggestions on how to go in that direction.