We need a middle class for startups

Ironically, I'm going to mention Alex Hormozi (who is very successful), but he said in an interview once that he spent something like $150k to talk to Grant Cardone and thought "I'm easily getting my ROI on that now because Grant's advice applies to someone in my position, where I have $100 MM. 10 years ago, when I was broke, the advice he's giving me now would have just put me further in insurmountable debt."

Most ultra-successful people somewhat forget the baseline that most people live in. For example, if they were to "restart with nothing", they usually assume that "nothing" still implies a good credit score, housing, food, healthcare, etc. which most of America is really spending all of their time trying to fight to secure. This translates to the out-of-touch and generally vague advice they give.

The reason "VC" or "bootstrapped from zero" (both are the author's words) are seen as the two available paths is... because they are seen as the two available paths.

Where do you get the funding to do a "middle-sized" business? The OP goes into this a little bit, but it seems to me that's the thing at the center of the whole discussion.

If people saw that it was feasible to find funding for a business that could grow faster and/or with less personal risk than what he is calling "bootstrapped from zero" (or is sometimes pejoratively called a "lifestyle business"); but without giving up the control that you do with VC funding -- of course people would be interested in starting a business like that, the appeal is obvious, right? It doesn't need to be made "cool". But, how? OP suggests "New non-dilutive funding sources are now available for revenue-generating businesses", okay, more on this, and hopefully it doesn't sound like a pyramid scheme or scamming retail "investors".

The things OP links to sound like... loans? OK... So this is just a variation of "bootstrapped from zero" where instead of just taking out credit card debt and loans from family and maybe a line of credit at your bank, you access loan products intended for new businesses? Are they secured by personal property? This doesn't sound so different from "bootstrapped from zero" to me, like these new sources of debt are going to make an entirely different business plan and category of business possible?

Then he moves on to advising that investors fund these businesses... in ways different than VC? Which would mean... without taking significant equity? Or without trying to maximize their payout? They're going to invest just planning on making money from dividends instead? And investors are going to do this because... it's been made "cool"?

I would love there to be more stable medium-sized sustainable businesses that don't pursue growth at all costs, treat their employees well, treat their communities well, etc. I feel like the OP weirdly seems to think the reason they aren't is becuase it's not "cool", rather than because of the economic factors. Businesses need capital, those with capital want to maximize their profit. So the two paths are either try for a capital-intensive startup that tries to give VC what they want; or you try to minimize the amount of capital you need by finding a way to start very small and have very slow but sustainable growth (the "bootstrapped from zero" "lifestyle business"). Making it "cool" to do something else does not solve these economic constraints. What might is talking about, say, changing the tax code to encourage a new type of business model or investment, or providing government subsidy for it, or something. Am I missing something?

The fact that SMB is literally two categories (Small and Medium Business) but effectively one category is a great way to capture the frustration here.

You mean a bourgeoisie?