Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

english.martinvarsavsky.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 160 posts

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#131

Post by k-mcgrady »

rtpg wrote: post #127
k-mcgrady wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I don't think people are resentful to entrepreneurs but it isn't glorified the way it is elsewhere. If I told an American friend I ran my own business they would usually be very interested and tell me how great that is. Most of the people I know (Europeans) tend to think of it as 'not a real job' and regular tell me 'I should get a real job'. These aren't people trying to hurt me, they legitimately believe…

to be fair I don't think that being a telecommuting software developer is glorified anywhere really. From France, the view seems to be that small businesses are mainly for artisanal things. People don't really have this idea of working your life away because our culture believes (rightly so? I imagine here the opinion might be opposite) more in that work is not the meaning of life, and so the idea of spending so many…

>> "Europe is not a country"

I completely agree. I was just referring to it as the article referred to it. I was talking specifically about the UK & Ireland.

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#132

Post by crucialfelix »

justincormack wrote: post #71
michaelfeathers wrote: post #53

Nice article, at least as a heads up for people. But, there are two areas that he did not go into. One was possibility of building a business around relationships with contractors rather than employees. I can imagine there being laws that would make that hard also. The other is that maternity/paternity leave is big consideration also. While I think they are great in many contexts, I've heard from business owners in N…

I dont know of any laws making working with contractors hard, so long as you are not apparently using them to avoid tax. Maternity and paternity are not usually a problem, obviously if your company is small anything can be a problem.

in Germany you have to be careful that you don't use a specific contractor too much or he will be designated as an employee.

source: I spoke to a German Tax accountant that specializes in startup consultation

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#133

Post by saraid216 »

james4k wrote: post #75
skrebbel wrote: post #43

Even though most of the dismissal comments here are fair and true, I find that this article contains some true gems: > When starting a company in the US, informality rules, we all know the HP story that HP was started out of a garage. Now in Europe work is so regulated that you can’t start a company out of a garage because you can’t legally work in a garage. > A friend of mine was fed up with an employee who worked p…

Stock options give employees a sense of ownership and responsibility in the company, which is a powerful thing.

I do not understand the kind of person whose sense of ownership and responsibility derives from the amount of potential money they have invested. To me, such a person doesn't feel any ownership and responsibility to the company: they feel ownership and responsibility towards their money, which is being held hostage from them contingent on a company's success.

I want to work for a company for whom I'm nearly willing to work for free. Like anyone else, I have bills and expenses and of course I want to be paid... but my goal is to produce and contribute value. Having my basic needs met is a foundation for that.

I dunno. Maybe I'd understand better if I got in on the ground floor of the next Google and cashed out when they hit it big?

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#134

Post by justincormack »

GFischer wrote: post #82

"state mandated severance pay packages... a direct attack to start ups" While it's true that many startups fail, I wouldn't go so far as to say severance pay is an attack. You can fire someone with two weeks notice in Spain, paying 33 days of severance for every year paid (used to be 45). AND take home salaries are usually lower. What is done in practice, to compare worker compensations across countries, is to factor…

Starting a company is still not that easy in the rest of Europe, eg Belgium there are capital requirements of EUR18000 to start a company still.

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#135

Post by ronaldmannak »

Svip wrote: post #15
RyanZAG wrote: post #14

I don't live in a country with the kind of employee protection rules as in Germany, but the article still comes off as a rant against employee protections. Can't afford to treat your employees like humans? Want to give them big bonuses and then fire them the following year so they can't pay the mortgage on that house they put a deposit down on with that bonus? Don't want to shell out a bit of money on decent offices,…

I also don't buy the notion that Europeans are generally resentful towards entrepreneurs.

You'd be surprised. Ambition is generally seen as bad. The best description of European culture(s) is the Law of Jante: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#136

Post by carlob »

mahesh_rm wrote: post #9
wilfra wrote: post #2

I'd be living on a beach in Italy right now were it not for the visa situation. Anybody know a way around the 90-day rule for Americans?

I am Italian. I set up a company in Italy and hire you. You set up a company in California and hire me. We pay each other the same minimum amount of money, and we are able to live where we want. If this fails, we can always get married!

It might be difficult to get married in Italy if you have the same gender… blame it on the catholic church!

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#137

Post by ronaldmannak »

I have founded tech startups both in Europe (Holland) and Silicon Valley. While some details are apparently debatable (judging from the discussion here), the overall picture seems very accurate. The fear of failure and personal liability is a huge issue in most European countries. I hate to say it, but there is a lot European countries can learn from Silicon Valley.

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#138

Post by oscargrouch »

rmc wrote: post #83
Xylakant wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some valid generalizations about europe. There are some mandated minimum holidays for example (4 weeks IIRC) and the tendency to have stronger employee rights. The work ethos is different as well, europeans tend to regard extreme outliers in wealth as extreme outliers, less as role models. The problem is that this article takes some assumptions that might be true for spain and uk and tries to sell them as '…

The work ethos is different as well, europeans tend to regard extreme outliers in wealth as extreme outliers, less as role models. I think part of these stems from the fact that some of the extreme outliers in europe (in terms of wealth or political power) often inherited their wealth. Whereas the USA has the attitude that "This is America, the land of oppertunity, where an illiterate immigrant can step off the boat…

I disagree with you, i think it has much more to do with the concept of happiness..

In US where the capitalism is too strong, people tendo to believe that wealthy = happiness

Despite not been a european, but a brazilian, i think europeans understand that happiness its a more tricky and uneasy concept to conquer.. and is made of much more values.. even the simplest ones..

They are far more sophisticated in human relationships and the concept of happiness..

but lets not generalize..i know a lot of sophisticated americans.. but is much harder to get there.. cause it needs one to get free from its own dominating culture..

In Brazil we have similar regulations, and labor parties are stronger and popular..

We try to work and be happy with our work, and make a living, but also we want time to have fun, to be with the family.. even if you have to earn less money..

those are different perspectives from the life quality we all want and spect.. different equations, different answers..

who are right? i think it always depends.. what is good for you may not be good for me.. and this means it cannot be enforced by the stronger part of the relationship..

freedom is based on choice.. on the capacity and possibility of choosing.. if someone stronger, be it a enterpreteneur or a country, enforce someone to take a path, that is just limiting individual freedom.. and that is a real threat..

People are different, and have different life values.. we should protect that.. not enforce the "everyone should fit into this box, please!" behavior

I tend to like more the way europeans live life than our brothers from north.. because its everything about happiness not about (just) money, and i think they(europeans) are more conscious about it.

Life should be driven by passion, making a living, money, wealthy.. should be just a consequence of that.. or not :)

Re: Advice for US entrepreneurs who move to Europe

#139

Post by carlob »

davidw wrote: post #26
Svip wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also don't buy the notion that Europeans are generally resentful towards entrepreneurs.

A ... well, I'm not going to get specific, as he's probably not too hard to locate via facebook or something, but a person I know through my wife was ranting about how all entrepreneurs are dishonest thieves at dinner the other day. Granted, this was an after-a-few-bottles-of-wine chat at the table, not a serious, reasoned opinion from someone who I do respect, but still, it's not an uncommon opinion here in Italy.

Well it's so easy to evade taxes when you are self employed as opposed to an employee or a civil servant, that this is often true.

Every time that you get your espresso and you don't get a receipt (which is more often than not), the owner of the café pays no taxes.

Post reply on HN