While I’m somewhat sympathetic to your point in general about loyalty, I think you’ve missed the point by a lot. This is more than “feel good words”, this is a

While I’m somewhat sympathetic to your point in general about loyalty, I think you’ve missed the point by a lot. This is more than “feel good words”, this is a concrete set of actions about compensation that affects how much money gets paid to whom. In the world of business it doesn’t get much further from “feel good words” than that. I would also advise caution about loyalty for equity. Bery few startup employees are paid enough on exit event—if it ever happens—to compensate for the time, stress, and loss of wages that they incurred over a non-startup job. Most people would be statistically better off not working for equity, and just accepting cash.