As you point out, the risk is what people often forget. My parent's have run a small business for over 20 years. Between 10 and 20 employees depending on the

As you point out, the risk is what people often forget. My parent's have run a small business for over 20 years. Between 10 and 20 employees depending on the season and the economic situation. When everything goes great, they can sometimes clear a few hundred thousand in the year. They are doing well and appear wealth. But then a bad job comes around, and they can lose their shirts. 3-4 times over the last 20 years, a big job has gone south and they have actually personally lost money for the year. One year in particular, they had to remortgage their house to meet payroll because conditions out of their control lost them a big contract. All the employees still get paid, but my parents have to go into debt and deal with the repercussions. The stress they deal with is immense. I've worked some high-stress corporate jobs, and it still has no compare to what I watched my parents deal with.