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Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

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Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#61

Post by tristan_juricek »

Better social nets probably would create much higher wages as employees think "screw this I'm gonna at least try it on my own", so companies have to up the ante.

But I don't see more entrepreneurs turning into economic growth. That takes a specific, rare entrepreneur that focuses on building growth, rather than replacing a paycheck.

On the flip side, I don't see less taxes becoming economic growth either. Taxes have to be pretty damn high to change your operations. The amounts usually talked about are not going to cause a company to say "hey let's build a new product".

The question should be "what's preventing companies from growing" instead of this class warfare framework. In the US, I see big companies being limited from growth by their own C-level executives' eye on their stock take - which makes no sense until you realize the amount of money they can gain from short term manipulation. But I see more of a problem due to bad skill sets - too many people have the wrong set of skills. A retail store clerk is not going to help anyone grow these days.

Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#62

Post by akurilin »

Without some kind of medical safety net, quitting your job to start a business becomes the luxury exclusive to the really healthy, the single, the really rich or the really lucky.

If you have any kind of condition that requires continuous oversight, you're screwed unless you have a ton of money saved up to afford a very expensive insurance plan.

If you're initially healthy, but suddenly get seriously ill, you might be set back by 7-10 grand before your cheapo $100/mo insurance plan kicks in. Even then you might still have to fight against the insurance company to have the necessary care approved and covered. You might hit the limits of your coverage.

If you have a family, you better hope that your spouse's job provides you with a comprehensive family-wide coverage, otherwise you'll have to deal with the exorbitant costs of insurance.

It's clearly sub-optimal, but the conservative side will often argue in favor of this system. I've (anecdotally) been told that if we provide everybody with universal health care then the masses will all start shooting up heroin all day and we, the hard working citizens, will have to foot the bill.

Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#63

Post by pinchyfingers »

pinchyfingers wrote: post #33

Consider the organizational qualities that create successful startups: agility, speed and clear vision. Entrepreneurs live and die by efficiency and effectiveness. This is the exact opposite of what government programs give us. Believing that any government initiative will enable entrepreneurship is naive. Founders relying on a government cushion to lower risk will be inviting unnecessary encumbrance. Government prog…

Honestly, how is this downvoted? wtf?

Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#64

Post by Hermitian »

sodafountan wrote: post #58

I think that this would result in hundreds of thousands of bad ideas hitting the marketplace and then the government having to bail out all of the crap that didn't succeed. Risk is there for a reason, it's to stop you from doing something stupid, to make you think twice about the decision you're about to make. I don't believe that we need government to bail out risk takers... not with the amount of national debt that…

I do agree that risk is essential and ought to be accepted. After all, I think I am more defined by my failures than anything else. But that deviates from the main discussion.

I think the main discussion revolves around healthcare, or the lack of healthcare for start-ups. It is one thing to take risk yourself, but it is another to jeopardize your family's health services. I think that's the main arguments.

Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#65

Post by _delirium »

suresk wrote: post #27
jcromartie wrote: post #9

Countries with much broader safety nets for entrepreneurs are not producing the risky innovative companies that America is. But, as far as I can tell, health insurance really is the biggest factor keeping people from starting new companies. For myself and my peers, with new families and houses and student debt, etc., it's the one thing that scares us more than anything else. The prospect of a business going under is…

Countries with much broader safety nets for entrepreneurs are not producing the risky innovative companies that America is. Could this be because countries with broader safety nets also have more regulation and make it hard to fire people? I've always kind of thought a combination of making it easy to hire people and let them go, along with strong safety nets (ie, good unemployment insurance and not having health car…

Denmark has been moving in that direction. Its overall level of safety nets, taxation, infrastructure spending, etc. is much higher than in the U.S. (tax revenues about 2x as high, as a percentage of GDP). But in some ways it's actually more privatized: for example, the bus system in Copenhagen is bid out to private corporations to operate. The government comes up with the fares, set of routes, etc., and then the corporations bid on how much subsidy they'd need to operate under the specified parameters (Movia won the current contract). Whereas, most American transit systems are operated by city or state employees.

And: it's fairly easy to fire someone, certainly easier than in most of the rest of Europe. The compensating factor is that the social safety net for the person who gets fired is also quite good, and not just in monetary benefits, but in active assistance to help them find a new job (both through job banks and training/internship programs). Incidentally, that is also outsourced, with a number of private (though subsidized and nonprofit) "a-kasse" social-insurance organizations competing for members. I'm a member of one that specializes in researchers, for example. If I become unemployed, for the first two years I would deal with them, not with the state. That tends to lead to people joining the organizations that they feel will provide the best job-finding assistance. Some element of competition is introduced, since a totally useless a-kasse would (hopefully) see an outflux of members.

Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#66

Post by martythemaniak »

The funny thing is, you can lower entrepreneurial risk without lowering the rewards, at least in this case.

The US is by far the most wasteful healthcare spender in the world, with vast amounts of money producing very mediocre outcomes. But as we saw, the political will is barely there, perhaps in another decade or two.

Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#68

Post by ryanmolden »

Anechoic wrote: post #48
waterlesscloud wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it possible that's just a handy self-justification, though? If healthcare wasn't an issue, would it be something else?

Isn't it possible that's just a handy self-justification, though? Looking specifically at the folks in my circle, I doubt for for two reasons: 1) they've seen me make a living at it for 9 years and they are all as smart, if not smarter than me and generally better connected than me, 2) a couple of folks in particular are supporting family members with medical needs.

#2 is a big issue because insurance companies love to deny pre-existing conditions. I believe there is some time-limit to them doing so, like after being on the plan for 6 or 9 months they start covering, but don't quote me on that. The idea that having a pre-existing condition can screw you pretty severely if you have to switch insurance ilproviders is crazy to me, especially since insurance is so tied to employer in the US. I realize insurance prefers healthy people to subsidize the sick, but once someone is diagnosed, "punishing" them for being sick, everytime they change insurance is just crazy to me. I guess I am too much of a socialist to see how that is a good societal move.

Re: Jon Stewart: Lower entrepreneurial risk

#69

Post by kalleboo »

pinchyfingers wrote: post #33

Consider the organizational qualities that create successful startups: agility, speed and clear vision. Entrepreneurs live and die by efficiency and effectiveness. This is the exact opposite of what government programs give us. Believing that any government initiative will enable entrepreneurship is naive. Founders relying on a government cushion to lower risk will be inviting unnecessary encumbrance. Government prog…

If government programs are so inefficient, why is U.S. healthcare the most expensive per capita in the world? I just don't buy the argument that governments do everything terribly.
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