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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

#111

Post by Rainymood »

radmuzom wrote: post #11

Ten 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…

TL, DR; It is much easier to do X if you have some basic level of financial security in your life.

Same goes for education. "Rich" people can pursue and education in terms of opportunity costs. Some kids I went to HS with had to work part time to support their own families, having less time to invest in their education ... really sad story.

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#112

Post by imauld »

gregpilling wrote: post #90

Every third world country I have been too is filled with entrepreneurs hustling to make a buck. Having money helps with big scale business; having no money means you are buying a bag of oranges and selling them off individually on the street corner. I do not come from a family with money. I grew up below the poverty line in fact. This article is crap. It is like saying "Entrepreneurs are all white males" because a lo…

I'm not sure this article is trying to down play successful ventures from non-stereotypical entrepreneurs but it's making the argument that that the image of the bold, risk taking entrepreneur might not be so accurate in the sense that that aren't really risking that much.

It doesn't say that all successful entrepreneurs are white, male and privileged. It just says that a lot of them are and that the largest indicator was being white, male and privileged.

This comic does an excellent job of summing it up:

http://thewireless.co.nz/articles/the-pencilsword-on-a-plate

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#113

Post by clavalle »

This seems like common sense -- those that have some sort of solid safety net tend to be able to stick to their search for a business model that works longer than someone that doesn't. Obvious. There are examples of people that take other paths but they tend to need more raw luck than people at the other end of the scale.

But I also notice that these people need not be from great wealth. They just need to know that they won't starve or go homeless and, perhaps, get a bit of help with business expenses. It just turns out that even that level of wealth is a bit hard to come by and doesn't apply to the majority of people in the US.

This is why I advocate for some sort of 'solid floor' socialism in the US. If people knew that they always had a meal and a place to live we'd see a lot more 'risk taking' because we will have removed a risk singularity from the market. We are really, really close to this already -- it would not take that much more to make our 'soft floor' welfare into something people can unquestionably count on.

We'd also see a lot more entrepreneurs serving currently underserved populations just because they will be drawn from that population and will know their pain points and how best to serve them.

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#114

Post by jrk_ »

jasonkester wrote: post #73

Entrepreneurs in other industries may need family money. Software Entrepreneurs can use their own. Working in an industry where $120k/year is considered a starting salary, and where you know for a certainty that you are roughly one Twitter post away from having your pick of three companies that will fight to get you, you can feel free to pursue any goofy idea you like without fearing much for your financial safety sh…

> one Twitter post away from having your pick of three companies

Can't concur on that one. I've been looking for more than a year for a job after graduation and getting through those interviews was hard. But maybe it's different here in Europe.

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#115

Post by mtberatwork »

aianus wrote: post #97
bakhy wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, but how many developers in the US get $100k? Throughout the first 10 years of their career? And I'm sorry, I should explain - I live and work in the EU, in Germany right now. So I can't compare. In any case, one can certainly save, and I'm not gonna lie, I could certainly spend less without losing too much :) But a claim like "10 years is enough to retire" seems a bit extreme.

$100k after tax (including stock) is basically starting salary in the valley for 22-year-old college graduates at big companies.

SV salary levels are not the norm across the industry. Furthermore, these high salaries in places like SV are often displaced by the extreme cost of living.

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#116

Post by VLM »

aianus wrote: post #97
bakhy wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, but how many developers in the US get $100k? Throughout the first 10 years of their career? And I'm sorry, I should explain - I live and work in the EU, in Germany right now. So I can't compare. In any case, one can certainly save, and I'm not gonna lie, I could certainly spend less without losing too much :) But a claim like "10 years is enough to retire" seems a bit extreme.

$100k after tax (including stock) is basically starting salary in the valley for 22-year-old college graduates at big companies.

Which brings us full circle back to the topic of the article such that its only children of rich parents who graduated from ivies, white "1% rock star programmer" males only, then you don't need the easy cash anyway.

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#117

Post by aianus »

bakhy wrote: post #103
aianus wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$100k after tax (including stock) is basically starting salary in the valley for 22-year-old college graduates at big companies.

well, a full answer to the question would also need the percentage of college graduates that land jobs in big companies in the valley... P.S. I don't think we'll get far with this... i just noticed, e.g., "median household income in the US" - that seems a tricky thing to compare with, given that many ppl in the US don't have health insurance, or live in trailer parks eating off food stamps...

I think almost all my (upper-year) classmates got offers to at least one of Amazon/Microsoft/Google/Facebook/Twitter/Palantir/Uber. And I went to a school in Canada that nobody's ever heard of (University of Waterloo).

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#118

Post by nathanvanfleet »

jrochkind1 wrote: post #38
maratd wrote: post #17

Earlier 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…

Sorry but that's just such a small part.

I have spoken to a friend who has rich parents, and the psychological effect is that they always know if something goes wrong they can just be supported by their rich parents when they get back on their feet.

Furthermore they know they can bum around until their parents die and get their retirement money in the form of inheritance. You might be surprised how ever-present that thought is to people like that.

But for people without that option, because their parents can't, they make the right decision and don't take a risk because there is nothing to fall back on.

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#119

Post by dagw »

whoiskevin wrote: post #85
gonzo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sure, there're exceptions when someone with little money and hard work managed to grow their business, but they're that - exceptions. My grandfather (and father) were that person.

Hmmm if your grandfather was successful in some significant way then your father benefited from that security which is exactly what the article is about. So claiming both were those exceptions is a bold claim indeed.

He could be talking about his maternal grandfather.

Re: Entrepreneurs don’t have a gene for risk – they come from families with money

#120

Post by clavalle »

rebootthesystem wrote: post #109

I'm sorry, I am going to call this nonsense. I am second generation from immigrants who arrived at these shores with nothing but the clothes on their backs. They escaped Genocide and other horrors. When they got here they grabbed whatever job they could. They had nothing. They saved their money. And when they could, they started their own small businesses (yes, both of my grandparents behaved the same way without kno…

You seem to think that by 'wealth' they mean access to millions of dollars.

Even 'sustain comfort' and have a little something leftover levels of wealth is not available to a sizable percentage of people in the US.

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