An even better question would be 'what are you willing to give up to start a startup?'. On most measures (experience, contacts, etc) you're better waiting a fe

An even better question would be 'what are you willing to give up to start a startup?'. On most measures (experience, contacts, etc) you're better waiting a few years before starting. The trick is that people tend to accumulate personal and financial obligations during that time that make a startup a much bigger sacrifice. If you end up on the spouse->house->kids->midlife-crisis-at-45 track before starting, you'll have a very hard time changing direction.