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Y Combinator cofounder Jessica Livingston to take year-long sabbatical
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- projectileboy 11y agoHard to think of any other individual who has made as large an impact on the global economy in the 21st century, in addition to opening up the playing field for women. Kudos.
- n72 11y agoThis statement seems, at first blush, absolutely absurd to me. Can you make a case for it?
- reviseddamage 11y agotake a break.
- projectileboy 11y agoGeez, I didn't mean to get everyone so worked up, but I was semi-serious. The impact of YC is going to be written about 100 years from now. There's a good chance that no individual company will be considered to have had the same impact.
- n72 11y agoOne, you said individual, not YC. Two, think of the handful of companies being written about from circa 1916. You really want to claim YC will have that kind of stature?
- projectileboy 11y agoPaul Graham and others have stated that Jessica was perhaps the main driving force behind YC. In 10 years, YC has produced multiple multi-billion dollar corporations, and it's only just getting started. Once we start seeing power companies, aircraft companies and more, then... Yes, I think YC will be judged in the future to have had the single biggest impact on the economy, at least of any company, in the first half of the 21st century.
- n72 11y agoYou're basing your case that JL was the mastermind behind YC on a "was perhaps"?
- projectileboy 11y agoI hope you have a better day on the internet tomorrow.
- n72 11y agoHey thanks! And I hope you find a cure for your miopia!
- dang 11y agoIt's bad enough that you prosecuted a nitpicking argument to the point of hounding, but adding personal insults takes this way over the line. Please don't do this again.
- n72 11y agoOkay, it would have been prudent to not bother with the "was perhaps" rebuttal. But the initial comment was par for the HN course and then a regular back-and-forth took place. Again, par for the HN course. And then there was an ad hominem directed at me. To which I foolishly responded. Yet I'm the one that gets chastised? You sure this doesn't have anything to do with the side I was taking in the argument?
- balls187 11y ago> Hard to think of any other individual who has made as large an impact on the global economy in the 21st century How about Jeff Bezos (AWS certainly powers more startups that YC)? or Steve Jobs (Mobile)? or Ryan Dahl (nodejs)?
- davidw 11y agoOn a recent comment thread, I talked about how rankings are inherently zero-sum - there can only be one at the top. A non zero-sum way of saying things might just be to thank JL for all the great work she's done, huge impact she's had, and so on. No arguments about 'the top person'.
- neurotech1 11y agoI have huge respect for jl but there is a significant number of senior executives who have a huge influence on the global economy in the 21st century. Gwynne Shotwell would be a good example. She is the President & COO of SpaceX, that is actively significantly reducing the cost of launching satellites, and working on global internet access. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwynne_Shotwell https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwynne_Shotwell
- pboutros 11y agoGood for her! A sabbatical sounds great. And she's definitely earned it.
- Fennhella 11y agoThanks for all the work thus far, isn't a day goes by where I don't use a YC company's service. hope there's plenty quality time in this sabbatical!
- julianpye 11y agoCongrats to Jessica! As a parent of a 1 year old mastercrawler, I am also so grateful to Paul taking time off earlier to spend time to watch his kids grow up and I love his tales of them growing up. Having a family changes everything. Right now parenthood is incompatible with startups - how can we change this and make startups better for young parents as well who for now will just always try to get corporate jobs?
- ben_jones 11y agoConsider these two statements that I believe to be true. "Start-ups are these great enterprises where individuals make huge sacrifices in order to take a chance at achieving amazing things." "Great parents make huge sacrifices in the best interest of their children". The problem is that you can only make so many sacrifices in life. Maybe one day we'll live in a utopia, but not anytime soon. Sometimes you have to pick one.
- eggy 11y agoThis is 'grown-up' truth vs. children's belief they can have everything; you sometimes have to chose. How you chose determines everything. I was very successful at what I did, but I couldn't save enough to early, or semi-retire due to family dependencies. I made the choice to take what little I did manage to save and live in East Java, Indonesia, where the savings will last me approximately one year. They would last all of 2 months maximum in NYC, or any other big Western city. The flip side is that I have been healthier than ever before. Sleeping more than 8 hours per day, exercising each day, meditating and just playing with my one-year old in a very rural setting (half or more houses have dirt floors here), with clean air. It is about choices, and sometimes the right choice is clouded by our daily routine, or personal fear to break out and try something new. I may be returning to a similar job if I don't find a way to make a minimal income to remain here, but it will always have been beneficial to my mental and physical well-being moving forward. I wish Jessica all the best, and regardless of her regrets with her family before, she is headed in a positive direction. Better late than never.
- 11y ago
- hoodoof 11y agoI was thinking of taking a holiday too.
- calcsam 11y ago"Livingston disclosed that she hadn’t spent any real time away from her work, including after her children were born — she placed the blame on herself for that." This always seems to be framed as a women's obligation. The children have two parents.
- rckclmbr 11y agoSo only one parent should spend time with children? As a father, I'd give anything to take a year sabbatical to spend more time with my kids.
- dominotw 11y ago> I'd give anything to take a year sabbatical to spend more time with my kids. My family had lots of nannies by profession. Most of them worked for rich people who had all the time to spend with their kids but they choose not to. Most of them would spend about a hour or two per day with their kids total. And these people are not exceptions by any means from what I've seen. I always found this fascinating and contrary to what everyone say they want, rich people are fascinating.
- 1123581321 11y agoHasn't Paul already stepped back from day-to-day management so presumably spends more time with their children? Also, if she blames herself, doesn't that mean she sees herself as having agency to either work or not work, which means that she isn't obliged to do either?
- product50 11y agoIt is not. It depends on how you want to read it. I can imagine this coming from a man and still make complete sense.
- graeme 11y agoIf you read paulg's twitter feed, it sounds like he has been spending a lot of time with children since retiring from YC. There's no need to twist words – I'd interpret Jessica's words as expressing a normal, human, desire to spend time with and get to know her children. She's been working at a very high level, and likely has seen much less of her children than someone working a regular 9-5 would.
- aresant 11y agoSF, the city, just approved fully paid leave for new parents for 6 weeks for everybody. http://www.sfgate.com/news/us/article/San-Francisco-poised-to-vote-on-full-paid-leave-7228281.php http://www.sfgate.com/news/us/article/San-Francisco-poised-t...
- mathattack 11y agoThat's a miserably low standard to hold ourselves to.
- NegativeLatency 11y agoI agree, but isn't it better than nothing?
- infinite8s 11y agoThat's worlds better than what is available anywhere else in the US. The federal government allows you to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid family leave without losing your benefits (through FMLA), and while the employer can't replace you they don't have to return you back to your original position.
- elliotec 11y agoIt's worlds worse than what is available everywhere else outside the US.
- ant6n 11y agoI guess that's like 3 months at 50%, assuming you can take another 6 weeks unpaid. In Quebec, both parents get a combined total of 57 weeks, with some pay cut, paid through a provincial insurance program. As in, everybody gets it, and the employer isn't directly financially burdened by babies.
- geographomics 11y agoThe USA has a lot of catching up to do with the rest of the world then. Six weeks paid leave is paltry compared to the vast majority of countries.
- danfitch 11y agoCongrats! It's amazing to live in an era of employers allowing friends to take a deep breath, reflect and come back to work with a renewed sense of themselves and their purpose. It is a great chance to reflect on what you have accomplished and what lies ahead.
- ericabiz 11y ago> employers allowing friends Your sentiment is there, but I find this choice of words a bit bizarre. Livingston is a co-founder of Y Combinator.
- danfitch 11y agoAnd I find that when you really dig deep and go for the projects that you are truly passionate about you will participate with people who are your friends. Words are words but the founders of Y combinator are a small group. I would think they are friends. A personal opinion/thought
- salmonet 11y agoI think he meant that since she was a cofounder she didn't really need permission
- prawn 11y agoYou still need permission of a sort.
- danfitch 11y agoNot sure what is really the meaning. I work hard as I am sure we all do. I am reading this thread while chasing around my 4 kiddos. We all need a beak and we are lucky and grateful to be given those opportunities. I follow hacker news daily so I am just happy that someone who made this all happen to get a chance to relax and reflect. It's deserved.
- mattmanser 11y ago
- booop 11y agoGood luck jl. Hope you come back refreshed with new ideas. Was hoping to find some sabbatical stories in the comments. I was working 12 hours a day with no weekends and felt trapped in a state of urgency and like I was missing out on things. Took a 3 month sabbatical and it changed everything! Sometimes you don't notice that you could have done things better or differently until you take a step back. I'm about to pass out and wish I could've written more.
- fs111 11y agoserious question: does she even have to work anymore? I would assume that a cofounder of ycombinator has so much money by now, that they could just retire or do something more fun with their lives.
- mightybyte 11y agoI think for many people who have had that level of success, the idea of "just retiring" is not very appealing. They have gotten to where they are because they have a strong drive to accomplish things that doesn't go away. If they just stopped everything and took a vacation, sooner or later they'll probably find themselves bored and want to dive back into a significant project again.
- AnimalMuppet 11y agoHave to? No. But note that she still intends to come back after the sabbatical year. So: Want to? Yes, she does.
- outericky 11y agoGuessing - no. And I'm sure it's been that way for many years. So if not money, what motivates a person? The great ones don't do it for the money.
- mathattack 11y agoOne of life's paradoxes... The same thing that drives people to earning a fortune drives them to work even after they don't need it.
- throwaway_45 11y agoI wish I could take a whole year off of work. I think SV lives in its own bubble.
- ant6n 11y agoMove to Canada.
- sydneysider 11y agoOmg, so sexist, it's this sort of patriarchal rape culture that stops women from becoming co-founders, as they will still be viewed as subordinates to their cismale co-founder partners. This is disgusting. /sarcasm
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- dang 11y agoPlease stop posting unsubstantive comments to Hacker News. We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11435194 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11435194 and marked it off-topic.
- doobiedowner 11y agoThis is the reason why women are payed as much as men?
- peripitea 11y agoShe is taking a sabbatical and will presumably not be paid. Any man could do the same. I understand you're trying to make a point about the fact that parental leave should be equal, but this was an off-base and unnecessarily acerbic way of making it.
- chris11 11y agoWhat does this have to do with gender? Would this have anything to do with the pay of iphone app developers if the announcement was made at WWDC?
- doobiedowner 11y agoI would have loved to have the privilege to watch the first year of my daughter's development without distraction.... But I'm a man... so, two weeks (and two weeks seems generous in comparison to my friends' experience)
- Sidnicious 11y agoThis seems like an example of how things are broken. Women are penalized[1] as employees because, unlike men, they might take maternity leave someday. One solution is to give everyone parental leave — and some countries do. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motherhood_penalty https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motherhood_penalty
- chris11 11y agoYeah, I agree. As a man I see great maternal leave policies as something I want for myself, not as sexism.
- wtbob 11y ago> One solution is to give everyone parental leave As a single guy, I love this, since it penalises folks in relationships, since they might someday take parental leave but I'll be in the office day-in and day-out.
- Gratsby 11y agoThat's kind of awesome.
- koolba 11y agoFrom the article: > She believes that a decade from now, she expects to see “tons of women-founded unicorns." Tons? Remove the women-founded filter and it's still not believable. I don't think it's realistic to expects tons of unicorns in general. How many have there been (total) in the past 10 years?
- billhendricksjr 11y agoI met Jessica when I interviewed at YC (Summer 2014 batch). She was very nice in addition to extremely intelligent, of course. She was smiling the entire time and made a clear effort to make me less nervous. I hope she enjoys the recharge!
- Natsu 11y agoI just wanted to wish you all the best. I hope you have time for many happy memories with your family :)
- infocollector 11y agoCan we make hacker news independent of Ycombinator please ? Or does this already exist?
- HemanHeartYou 11y agoShe needs time to "think"