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Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

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Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#101
post #95
post #46

Middle class in the US goes up to about $120k. I dont know any licensed tradespeople that work for themselves that make less than this.

Electricians $50-60k: https://www.indeed.com/career/electrician/salaries https://www.salary.com/research/salary/alternate/electrician... Plumbers: $60k https://www.salaryexpert.com/salary/job/plumber/united-state... https://www.salary.com/research/salary/alternate/licensed-pl... Now those aren't self employed, but "What Kind of Money Can a Self-Employed Master Plumber Make Annually?" Suggest maybe 20% more for self e…

Maybe you hit upon it: "work for themselves".

For every painter that owns his own company, a dozen guys are climbing ladders and slinging paint buckets for him.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UBI needs to be paired with restricting rent increases or eliminating zoning restrictions that limit housing supply then.

As a landlord, and landlording in an area with restricted rent, it makes zero difference. It's only good if you stay where you rent, but if you move, it's market rent. You can't adequately control market rent because there are so so many variable on what market rent is for every individual unit, location, type, etc. I'm all for the eliminating zoning restrictions though.

I was thinking of something like a cap on rent increase (e.g. max 10% rent increase or something like that), not banning rent increase entirely, if it matters. Maybe with exceptions if the landlord improves (not just maintains) the property.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#103
Intelligence is overrated. It's one piece of the puzzle. If we look for "one factor" that's responsible for success we are going to be searching for a long time.

Income is a more robust metric because it is a somewhat natural combination of many personal characteristics.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#104

I've known this for decades. When Bill Gates started publishing Smart Basic (or whatever) in magazines, I got a copy and saw what crap it was. I could do better. Why didn't I? That was my very first thought. The reason was, I had to work halftime to pay tuition and buy food. I was mired in working to live. Ol Bill had a family to support him as he bought resources (ads in magazines etc), recruited staff, took meeting…

The problem with most welfare schemes is they have big welfare cliffs. You make one dollar more than a certain amount and you lose thousands in benefits. It's the virtual equivalent of a greater than 100% marginal income tax. Also, countries with greater welfare programs don't have greater entrepreneurship. The opposite is somewhat true. Probably due to higher taxes and it's very hard to go out of business once you'r…

I know that France is the butt of many jokes about work, "no French word for entrepreneurship," but in my experience almost every business I interacted with around socialist Paris was a small, independent business. This was the unintentional consequence of labor laws. 50 employees you're in a tight spot until you're >1000 employees. Then the additional overhead of benefits for those employees is subsidized by economies of scale.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#105

I've known this for decades. When Bill Gates started publishing Smart Basic (or whatever) in magazines, I got a copy and saw what crap it was. I could do better. Why didn't I? That was my very first thought. The reason was, I had to work halftime to pay tuition and buy food. I was mired in working to live. Ol Bill had a family to support him as he bought resources (ads in magazines etc), recruited staff, took meeting…

While there will be a few folks that will prosper from basic income, I can’t say I’m interested in paying people to pursue things that are more like hobbies. For every entrepreneur or community volunteer that makes a difference, I fear 9 others will set their sights on being gaming streamers or will just sit around writing blogposts. If you aren’t adding value somewhere and are able minded and able bodied, I don’t want to invest my money in you.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#106
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or all the UBI money would pump up rents to the point that living costs make it infeasible again.

I imagine UBI would be good for landlords.

Henry George held that belief on steroids and thought that, unless you taxed away the site value of land, then almost all of the benefits of any good policy or improved economic activity would accrue to landowners.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#107
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Healthcare and Basic Income would do a lot to encourage entrepreneurship. I have a dream that Healthcare will someday be decoupled from employment. So much waste is tolerated simply due to the fact that the majority of the expense is borne by your employer before the number they put on your paycheck. I can live on a part time salary without issue, but health insurance, which is already $200/wk for my family with my…

They could even do this without too many major changes. Just three in fact: - Increase HSA Contribution Limit - Allow both Traditional & High Deductible insurance premiums to be paid with the HSA - Ban employers from directly providing/choosing insurance (ex. US Military) Essentially everyone goes out onto the open market and buys their insurance using pre-tax HSA contributions (similar to tax benefits to employers n…

Is there any momentum behind these ideas? I don't have any idea what the state of US healthcare reform is.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#108
post #52
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or all the UBI money would pump up rents to the point that living costs make it infeasible again.

Soviet style housing is an answer and also not an answer. It would provide housing for people on UBI, but because it’s operating on a thin budget, over time it becomes less desirable. Now, it’s not always the case _if_ you can get the tenants to coöperate and pitch in on basic maintenance and keep anti social behavior at bay ala Singapore, but my feeling is we’re not of the same mindset as Singaporeans.

Any creation of affordable housing contributes to slowing down increasing prices.

Many countries do this by putting legal limits against gentrification.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#109
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or all the UBI money would pump up rents to the point that living costs make it infeasible again.

Rents only get pumped up if we don't have enough housing to go around... in which case regular incomes do the same thing.

Meaning that, unless you fix housing, UBI doesn't make a difference.

Re: Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

#110
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Healthcare and Basic Income would do a lot to encourage entrepreneurship. I had to also wait till I paid off my student loans. There are a whole lot of shackles if you come from a humble background to starting a company full time. On the other hand it has never been cheaper to start a side hustle.

> Healthcare and Basic Income would do a lot to encourage entrepreneurship Would it though? From what I understand EU has way better social safety nets, yet much smaller entrepreneurship rates compared to USA. Counter-intuitively, limitations drive innovations. When your resources are limited, you are forced to innovate. When you have infinite resources, you tend to waste it. Ever notice that when you have infinite t…

Regarding the entrepreneurship rates, are gig economy workers considered entrepreneurs?

Also, where did you find these numbers indicating such a big difference?

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