Exact same thing I've felt. I've met a number of founders and while there are definitely the ones who had nothing but smarts and a strong degree, the majority had this idea that if things don't work out, there's family to back them up.
Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
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Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#42In other words, starting a business isn't much different than it was in the past - capital and connections are essential. Sure, there're exceptions when someone with little money and hard work managed to grow their business, but they're that - exceptions. The older I am the more I realize how naive thinking "I just need to create something better than my competitors!" really is. You can have a mediocre product but wi…
No matter how good the product is, if the distribution is poor, it will go no where.
The first customers are often people you know well, who need the product. I.E connections.
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
> “This whole bulk of the population is being seduced into thinking that they can just go out and pursue their dream anytime, but it’s not true.” > Cool. Know your place, leave enterpreneurship to blue bloods - that's the conclusion? No. "When basic needs are met, it’s easier to be creative; when you know you have a safety net, you are more willing to take risks. “ The solution is providing a social safety net that e…
> The solution is providing a social safety net that enables that bulk of the population to pursue their dream. We have a huge "social safety net" here in France and yet we are way less entrepreneurial than in the US. I moved to Peru for 4 years to save some money and then came back to start a business, the entrepreneurial spirit was way strong stronger there even though the social safety net is inexistent. Fact is,…
It's hard to start business in france because of the regulatory bs.
Even trying to register a company is a right pain.
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It is very hard to take risks when you are not financially secure There's a caveat here. It depends on your responsibilities. If you have children, fixed expenses, then absolutely. If you have nothing to your name and no responsibilities, it's very easy to take risks without anything to fall back on. After all, you have very little to lose.
That might (or might not) be true materially; but I would not ignore the psychological effects of growing up financially secure vs. not, and what it tends to do to your capacity to take financial risks specifically. If you don't even hardly know what it feels like to have no safety net at all, if you know you do have a safety net in the form of family that will help you out if things get _really_ bad, at least to kee…
true. there was an interesting text posted here once, about how one of the worse things about poverty is that it kills the will to dream big and make plans. when you're scraping by, it's much harder, and any big plan can easily fall through due to bad luck (some unexpected expenses you cannot cover eat up your small savings, e.g., and ironically, since poverty is not healthy, unexpected expenses are more likely).
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
So go out and make another $5. How you expect to make a 1MM if you can't even make $5. Thank you for reading it, and also stop making excuses. Everyone one else commenting please refer to this comment, thanks.
An entrepreneur at the end of their runway, facing the extinction of something they fought and struggled over, experiences depression, anxiety and regret. And gets sympathy for their plight. A person who's life is made up of 'being at the end of their runway' is shamed for not just 'go out and make another $5'. Nothing disingenuous about this dichotomy?
A person's life is their responsibility. The only thing disingenuous is believing that is not so. A person brings shame upon themselves when they blame others for lack, instead of choosing to create for themselves.
Your fancy words conceal an illogicality of thought. Clear your thought, before you clothe it in fancy words, otherwise you get confused. Stopping making excuses and tolerating that from others, is the way of genuine concern for helping others improve.
Believing differently is your choice, and it won't work. Think more before you write more.
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#46Friends! If you find someone trying to criticize your achievement as being "just because you are privileged" say "I'm now further from where I started, than where I started was from where you started. So if you couldn't even make it from where you started to where I started, how do you expect that you could have made it from where I started to where I am now?" People may choose to respond to this by saying something…
How can people even read this to disagree with it -- wouldn't it be too faded out? o_O
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#47After teenage angst, came a time of value/family fallout for me. At one point, I haven't even been face to face with any of them for a period of almost 2 years. Not that anything was particulary wrong with anyone, mind you. After 100+ hour workweeks slaving for someone else, ending up in ER several times (but still showing up 8AM sharp day afterward), finally burning out, quitting job, breaking up, and living in windowless installation-free underground solid-cement garage for better part of year (life's paraphernalia funded entirely by sale of single iPhone), I've come home.
I cannot even describe what sort of relief I felt having my meals provided for, laundry taken care of, having bed to sleep in, someone to talk to, help to, care for... That was when I figured, given this bare essentials provided by family, I have basically nothing to lose by taking much more risks in life and working on what I care about. I like to think I've instilled that appreciation to my siblings, as well as parents.
Three months after that, I've found investors, moved to freeload in one of their penthouses, while I work in a high-risk field of game development. We'll see how that turns out, but I have no fear - I have family to fall back on.
---
I'm aware not everyone has what I have with my family, but I'm certain many more do not appreciate what they already have.
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#48Friends! If you find someone trying to criticize your achievement as being "just because you are privileged" say "I'm now further from where I started, than where I started was from where you started. So if you couldn't even make it from where you started to where I started, how do you expect that you could have made it from where I started to where I am now?" People may choose to respond to this by saying something…
> Friends! If you find someone trying to criticize your achievement as being "just because you are privileged"...
As the Spartans said to Philip of Macedonia: "If."
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#49Friends! If you find someone trying to criticize your achievement as being "just because you are privileged" say "I'm now further from where I started, than where I started was from where you started. So if you couldn't even make it from where you started to where I started, how do you expect that you could have made it from where I started to where I am now?" People may choose to respond to this by saying something…
> "I'm now further from where I started, than where I started was from where you started. So if you couldn't even make it from where you started to where I started, how do you expect that you could have made it from where I started to where I am now?"
That is so ridiculously built on false premises that I don't even know where to start. But for starters, you are assuming that the 'effort' (since that's all you think it takes) to get from, say $10K to $100K, is exactly equivalent to the effort to get from $100K to $190K, or whatever. Unlikely to be true.
Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money
#50Ten years back, when I was fresh out of college, I joined a startup - not as a founder but as the first employee. A lot of it was driven by reading Paul Graham's essays, and I was naive and immature enough to believe that I was doing something great (as an aside, I came from an economically disadvantaged family; and every cent of my assets today is something I have earned and not something which I have inherited or o…
> Now after ten years mostly working in large companies, I have some savings which will allow me to last two years in case I lose my job.
After 10 years of being a software engineer you should have enough to retire forever (albeit in some third world country).