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Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship

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

#131

Post by Someone1234 »

snakeboy wrote: post #107
Someone1234 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Nope.

The current "war" is between complete re-invention and essentially the status quo. This is neither of those, therefore it upsets both sides, and gets squished by "perfect is the enemy of good."

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

#132

Post by cgh »

umvi wrote: post #77
abhiyerra wrote: post #20

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…

But the study says exactly the opposite, that ample resources are key to innovation. Basic income would replace parental income as a backstop.

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

#133

Post by throwaway2037 »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #80
xapata wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK is probably worse off for having such an obvious clue that someone is high class. Accents are harder to switch than clothes and a haircut.

Maybe. Growing up in the U.S., my obvious lack of straight teeth (single mother could not afford braces for my sister or me) gave away my pedigree.

Second login with my throwaway account today! Apologies in advance: This stuff is much too personal to post under my real identity.

Exactly this, in my experience. I am from a upper-middle-class family. I live in East Asia now, and wealthy by local standards. Whenever I travel to developing countries in Asia, I am regularly reminded of my upper-middle-class-plus-plus status by the straightness and whiteness of my teeth! Yes, literally, I can count on many, many hands how many times random strangers approach me on the street/bus/train/hotel/airport in developing countries with comments about my straight and/or white teeth. (Please: Do not read humble-brag into that.)

Could we, perhaps, say that accent is a big social divide in UK, whereas teeth are a big social divide in US? I would love to hear from Canadians, Kiwis, Aussies, Saffers, etc...(anyone!) about experiences in their home culture.

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

#134

Post by cloverich »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #85
jcadam wrote: post #8

All my attempts at entrepreneurship have been via moonlighting, and have failed. There just aren't enough hours in the day. But I can't just quit my day job and take my income down to $0 to pursue a startup.

I find your comment amusing because, of course you can. And famously, the people that made it big did just that. But I get it, I'm like you. Also had a college loan to pay off, later kids.... So I stuck to the day-job, read about the high-flyers and work instead on trying to get-rich-slowly.

On a similar note, I've noticed that some of the successful entrepreneur's I know took success in one area and applied it to another, often in the form of re-investing their savings. Watching someone go from salaried to having a million in savings, and then investing _all_ of it into a new business that's not guaranteed to succeed... I question whether I could do that. A million dollars is enough to retire ahead of schedule, would I be willing to risk it all and go back to a salaried employee with no savings? Yet I've noticed many successful people do this, often repeatedly.

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

#135

Post by Aunche »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #4

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…

In that case, you would except a lot more entrepreneurs from Saudi Arabia. Instead, you have a bunch of freeloaders who outsource their work to foreigners. They started a UBI program a few years ago. Before that, they had a jobs program that essentially functioned as UBI, since it was nearly impossible to fire a Saudi citizen.

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

#137

Post by BluePen8 »

abhiyerra wrote: post #20
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #4

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…

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.

With the caveat that as long as it doesn't require physical space.

With the cost of space in any major city, anything that requires a workshop, working space, or significant storage space is out of the window nowadays for anyone in a major city.

When I was a teenager my side hustle was buying, fixing, and selling used cars. My dad's was the same with small fishing boats.

The story of these billion dollar companies being started in their parent's garage sounds inspirational and all, but I'd imagine less so for the kids whose parents can't afford home with a garage.

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

#139

Post by anonuser123456 »

jeffreyrogers wrote: post #11
exabrial wrote: post #7

Correlation, not Causation The actual cause is more than likely: parents who have high income set a precedent for self-employment.

Doesn't fit in with what I've seen personally. Most of the people I know who've started companies have parents in high-paying jobs where they work for someone else, e.g. finance, medicine. Edit: I'm also not saying you need to have family help to be a successful entrepreneur. Maybe the most successful person I know personally did it on his own, but he is unusual.

Risk tolerance and deferred gratification are heritable traits.

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

#140

Post by theinverseidea »

koverda wrote: post #81
theinverseidea wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cant wait for basic income, because I cant wait to quit my job and focus on my ideas.

If you can't wait, start focusing on your ideas now. Chip away, one hour a day, every day.

Of course, I'm not complaining.

Just stating plainly I welcome the opportunity to do it full-time.

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