Parents' income, not smarts, key to entrepreneurship • Hacker News Board

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

#221

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:20 PM UTC

advisedwang wrote: post #192

danenania wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It definitely makes a huge difference to have savings if you want to be an entrepreneur. But these days, a decent programmer can save up a year or more of runway and build industry connections just by working for a few years and not spending outlandishly. If the startup doesn't work out, a new cushy job is waiting for you. So yeah, startups are risky and favor the wealthy, but let's not overstate the case. I'm in fav…

Realistically a startup needs more than a year or two of runway for one person. It requires several years of runway for several people, plus paying for infrastructure, legal work, marketing etc.

[deleted]

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

#222

Post by nlitened » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:22 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #216

iguy wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe. But the counter is that entrepreneurship has strong network effects, it really pays to be around other talented people and hear about the future they're busy inventing. Maybe we'd see the opposite, people leaving a stable job which ties them to some unexciting place, to try to make it in NYC.

> But the counter is that entrepreneurship has strong network effects, it really pays to be around other talented people and hear about the future they're busy inventing. The actual powerful network effects are essentially a somewhat benign form of cronyism, not mere inspiration from other entrepreneurs. People do more business with less haggling with friends than with strangers.

> People do more business with less haggling with friends than with strangers.

This is how humans work. This cannot change with UBI.

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

#223

Post by snicker7 » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:35 PM UTC

The clear solution is to make Jeff Bezos everyone's dad.

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

#224

Post by mixmastamyk » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:40 PM UTC

ozim wrote: post #195

mixmastamyk wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The focus here is on the hustling Bill of the 80s, not billionaire Bill of the 90s.

Don't forget that this guy full name is: William Henry Gates III. He is not your friend Bill from across the street that most of people could compare with.

Next you'll be telling me ascots aren't standard morning wear. (One of my favorite cartoon alter egos as a child was Henry Cabot Henhouse, III.)

Still this is the whole point of the article, he makes a reasonable example.

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

#225

Post by tsimionescu » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:43 PM UTC

nlitened wrote: post #222

tsimionescu wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But the counter is that entrepreneurship has strong network effects, it really pays to be around other talented people and hear about the future they're busy inventing. The actual powerful network effects are essentially a somewhat benign form of cronyism, not mere inspiration from other entrepreneurs. People do more business with less haggling with friends than with strangers.

> People do more business with less haggling with friends than with strangers. This is how humans work. This cannot change with UBI.

Agreed, wasn't trying to claim that it would, just pointing out that network effects are not about inspiration, mainly.

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

#226

Post by tsimionescu » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:46 PM UTC

umvi wrote: post #217

tsimionescu wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So I would argue that you do see more innovation from poor families than rich families. After all, rich families have no need to innovate, they just throw money at problems until they go away. This is not something to argue about, this is something that that we should measure.

And how do you measure innovation in poor families? Does jerry-rigging your car to work using duct tape and aluminum cans count?

In the discussion here, I am assuming innovation refers specifically to innovative products and business ideas, not stuff that remains confined to your close family.

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

#227

Post by Gibbon1 » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:46 PM UTC

heavyset_go wrote: post #161

umvi wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

Rates of entrepreneurship are higher in Scandinavian countries than they are in the US.

I've heard that as well. A reminder that most entrepreneurs aren't founding web tech companies.

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

#228

Post by burntoutfire » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:50 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #52

SilasX wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or all the UBI money would pump up rents to the point that living costs make it infeasible again.

Soviet style housing is an answer and also not an answer. It would provide housing for people on UBI, but because it’s operating on a thin budget, over time it becomes less desirable. Now, it’s not always the case _if_ you can get the tenants to coöperate and pitch in on basic maintenance and keep anti social behavior at bay ala Singapore, but my feeling is we’re not of the same mindset as Singaporeans.

> Now, it’s not always the case _if_ you can get the tenants to coöperate and pitch in on basic maintenance and keep anti social behavior at bay ala Singapore, but my feeling is we’re not of the same mindset as Singaporeans.

I live in Soviet-style housing in Poland. The antisocial behavior of some tenants (it seems that there's always at least one) is something you learn to live with. Over the years, you start ignoring the occasional puke in the hallway or automatically put on headphones when someone next to you starts blaring loud music again. All in all, given how much people pay for such flats in Poland, my guess is that it would be totally acceptable for most people to deal with the inconveniences, if the flat was free as a part of the UBI.

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

#229

Post by sudosysgen » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:50 PM UTC

ch4s3 wrote: post #220

sudosysgen wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my province, the rent office arranges for two measures to counterbalance and increase mobility. Firstly, most rental agreements are made to end on July 1st - legally up to 1974 but now mostly out of tradition. This allows for much less friction, as everyone can change housing without any downtime with access to the full market. Secondly, landlords are allowed to evict if they do sufficient improvements to the prop…

Ahh, are you in Quebec? > landlords are allowed to evict if they do sufficient improvements to the property This is a REALLY unusual provision in rent stabilization laws in the US and as far as I know the EU which normally don't allow evictions like this and severely cap rent increases for improvements. If you are in Quebec, the RDL is really unique as a form of rent control in that it doesn't set prices or cap incre…

The Régie des logements in Québec absolutely does cap price increases, or even forbid them outright some years.

It also does extra controls that many countries don't do, such as capping price increases even if the tenant change (the tenant needs to request the former rent, though).

Allowing rent increases in the case of renovations is unusual, but not that rare either. That said, it's absolutely not "just a dispute resolution board". It 100% is traditional rent control with capped price increases, on top of the rest.

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

#230

Post by iguy » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:59 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #216

iguy wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe. But the counter is that entrepreneurship has strong network effects, it really pays to be around other talented people and hear about the future they're busy inventing. Maybe we'd see the opposite, people leaving a stable job which ties them to some unexciting place, to try to make it in NYC.

> But the counter is that entrepreneurship has strong network effects, it really pays to be around other talented people and hear about the future they're busy inventing. The actual powerful network effects are essentially a somewhat benign form of cronyism, not mere inspiration from other entrepreneurs. People do more business with less haggling with friends than with strangers.

I think you're talking about networking for money, and that's a thing.

But there are also ideas. Even in fields where there's basically no money, half the world's innovation happening within a circle of a few miles is routine. For instance this happens in music, repeatedly.