Ask HN: If I am so smart, why I am not rich?

Be careful of survivor bias here, there are lots of very obsessed entrepreneurs who have failed.

Yes, but you can keep trying. In entrepreneurship, you only need to be right once. Most successful entrepreneurs have had failed startups and projects before they got it right.

>The whole idea of if you work really hard you are guaranteed success gives too many people unrealistic hope

It's not guaranteed, but it's the best system to get what you want, that we have.

On the other hand, if you gave 10 people a job at BigTech, 10 a job at a well known non tech company and told 10 to go start a business, which one of those groups do you think would have the highest median and mean compensation history over 5 years? 10 years?

I posit that it would be BigTech, Enterprise Dev and the startup founders would come in dead last.

Heck I got close to a million dollars in “revenue” just working as a mid level (L5) remote employee at BigTech for 3.5 years and I was paid 10-15% less in my position (cloud consulting) than the equivalent SDE.

If that were my major concern at this point in life (I’m 50), there are much easier ways to have a million dollars in “revenue” over 3-4 years for anyone in tech than starting a business with much less work and risks.

I've started businesses (and by most measures, successful ones), and despite what all the gurus will tell you, I would not wish it on anyone.

I tell people often, don't do it. Unless you're a certain type of person, do something else, and even if you're that sort of person, it's probably going to suck. A lot. We're not honest enough about this in our society, because people have a certain respect for entrepreneurs and aspire to be one themselves. And there's an entire cottage industry that preys on these aspirations (yes, that includes some of these startup incubators, etc).

Really, you know if you're the sort of person who will keep going or not. You know if you'll love the challenge of pulling together a million different pieces (half of which you know nothing about sometimes) and when to check yourself... or not. You know what to listen to others... or not.

Most people are not built like this. I'm close friends with a number of very successful entrepreneurs, and they're... weird. Good folks, but always weirdos.

That said, since it's in your title, I have a high IQ (145) but I think it's important to add, I grew up in the ghetto, where such an IQ is not considered an asset... instead, force and street savvy often are.

The reason I bring this up is because I've done okay for myself. Not insane, but decent. I thrive in organizing chaos. Not to be too dramatic, but that's what starting a business is like, especially when it's your own money on the line. Most of the successful people I know in starting businesses are also smart, process-oriented, and curious as all Hell.

For perspective, I'm comfortable reading scientific papers outside my expertise and seeing the potential business applications that the MBAs likely aren't looking at, because, well, they're thinking about other things. I'm comfortable shooting the shit with my plumber... or my siblings in very niche tech or science. I love breaking things and asking both these types of people for help, so they can laugh at me. I've done some incredibly stupid things in the name of curiosity.

My advice? Stop reading, stop talking. Flip a coin and take a risk on something you want to see to its end. Then burn yourself out to see where it goes. But be prepared for a lot of heartache and pain.

If you do this, hit me up after. Would love to hear how it went.

And luck. Or, to put it another way -- which kind of is luck: What "the right work" is, and whether you reach your market or not, is influenced by so many other hard-to-predict things besides your own input, that getting it right among all these confounding factors is pretty much the definition of "luck".