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Another EU citizen here, resonating with your words. It seems that Europe has decided to stop evolving and just do anything to protect the status quo. All thes

by nickpp 6y ago

Another EU citizen here, resonating with your words. It seems that Europe has decided to stop evolving and just do anything to protect the status quo. All these regulations just trying to keep those damn disruptors at bay. Innovation is forbidden here. But hey! It’s for our own good.

ChuckNorris89 6y ago
>It seems that Europe has decided to stop evolving and just do anything to protect the status quo. Innovation is forbidden here. But hey! It’s for our own good. Yeah, this. Europe is an old continent that's mostly old money. The Europeans of today are rich mostly due to inherited wealth and former imperialism, not wealth they created themselves through innovation, with some families tracing their wealth back for centuries when land was cheap and plentiful and taxes were next to nothing that any hardworking person could buy land and build a business and while the wealth didn't go stratospheric, it still multiplied handsomely for their successors since "time in the market beats timing the market". If you look at Europe's biggest and wealthiest companies, most of them are several decades if not centuries old with some of their major shareholders still being old European nobility, in contrast to the US where the top tech companies are at most 30 years old, with older ones that fail to innovate always dying in a healthy cycle (IBM, Sun, Oracle, SGI, etc.), leaving room for new players(FAANG) to come on the market and eat the lunch of the dinosaurs. While in Europe, with so much of the pie taken by the old players, there's no more room for new players to spring up since the old established ones pulled the ladder up after them. The image of the typical wealthy successful German is not that of a hip 20-30 year old who built some cool business in his dorm room or his parents' garage like in the US, but of a 40 year old man with a Porsche who inherited his dad's machine shop and rolodex(typical owner of the famous Mittelstand that's always revered here on HN). All this old wealth is very risk adverse and feels threatened by disruptions and will fight tooth and nail to keep their status quo.
- nickpp 6y ago
  And further: don’t bother starting that business dear citizen. Don’t worry your pretty little head with entrepreneurship, it’s too complicated for you. Just take one of these comfy government jobs we’re providing and you’ll be fine. We'll even take care of your pension and give you "free" health care.
  - croes 6y ago
    Yeah, let's be like the US in the corona pandemic, not. That adored business mostly exploited either their users or their employees. Facebook, Amazon, Uber, etc.
  - piva00 6y ago
    Don't do this kind of generalisation, this is exactly the opposite mindset of Sweden, for example. Here entrepreneurship is valued and supported by the government, not only directly but indirectly with a good safety net in case of failures, trying to start a company is completely doable and encouraged.
- 908B64B197 6y ago
  What I wonder is how many of these wealthy Europeans own FAANG stocks?
  - ChuckNorris89 6y ago
    You can bet that most of them that diversified did so, with the emphasis being they own US tech stocks, not EU tech stocks.
idkwhoiam 6y ago
Couldn't agree more. The EU is well behind the rest of the world in terms of innovation. We spend all our time thinking about new taxes & regulations. IMO all this bureaucracy will kill the EU.
I_am_tiberius 6y ago
As a founder myself, I can't agree more. For startups the EU becomes more and more poisonous.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

by nickpp 6y ago

ChuckNorris89 6y ago

>It seems that Europe has decided to stop evolving and just do anything to protect the status quo. Innovation is forbidden here. But hey! It’s for our own good. Yeah, this. Europe is an old continent that's mostly old money. The Europeans of today are rich mostly due to inherited wealth and former imperialism, not wealth they created themselves through innovation, with some families tracing their wealth back for centuries when land was cheap and plentiful and taxes were next to nothing that any hardworking person could buy land and build a business and while the wealth didn't go stratospheric, it still multiplied handsomely for their successors since "time in the market beats timing the market". If you look at Europe's biggest and wealthiest companies, most of them are several decades if not centuries old with some of their major shareholders still being old European nobility, in contrast to the US where the top tech companies are at most 30 years old, with older ones that fail to innovate always dying in a healthy cycle (IBM, Sun, Oracle, SGI, etc.), leaving room for new players(FAANG) to come on the market and eat the lunch of the dinosaurs. While in Europe, with so much of the pie taken by the old players, there's no more room for new players to spring up since the old established ones pulled the ladder up after them. The image of the typical wealthy successful German is not that of a hip 20-30 year old who built some cool business in his dorm room or his parents' garage like in the US, but of a 40 year old man with a Porsche who inherited his dad's machine shop and rolodex(typical owner of the famous Mittelstand that's always revered here on HN). All this old wealth is very risk adverse and feels threatened by disruptions and will fight tooth and nail to keep their status quo.

nickpp 6y ago
And further: don’t bother starting that business dear citizen. Don’t worry your pretty little head with entrepreneurship, it’s too complicated for you. Just take one of these comfy government jobs we’re providing and you’ll be fine. We'll even take care of your pension and give you "free" health care.
- croes 6y ago
  Yeah, let's be like the US in the corona pandemic, not. That adored business mostly exploited either their users or their employees. Facebook, Amazon, Uber, etc.
- piva00 6y ago
  Don't do this kind of generalisation, this is exactly the opposite mindset of Sweden, for example. Here entrepreneurship is valued and supported by the government, not only directly but indirectly with a good safety net in case of failures, trying to start a company is completely doable and encouraged.
908B64B197 6y ago
What I wonder is how many of these wealthy Europeans own FAANG stocks?
- ChuckNorris89 6y ago
  You can bet that most of them that diversified did so, with the emphasis being they own US tech stocks, not EU tech stocks.

idkwhoiam 6y ago

Couldn't agree more. The EU is well behind the rest of the world in terms of innovation. We spend all our time thinking about new taxes & regulations. IMO all this bureaucracy will kill the EU.

I_am_tiberius 6y ago

As a founder myself, I can't agree more. For startups the EU becomes more and more poisonous.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]