I suspect most people still want the comfort of a stable job or career. Problem is that for the last ten years it has been hard to find good ones in the general

I suspect most people still want the comfort of a stable job or career. Problem is that for the last ten years it has been hard to find good ones in the general economy, outside a few growth areas of questionable sustainability (housing, finance, health care). So the opportunity cost for 20-30 somethings to doing their own thing has fallen, even if people don't want to admit it. The other difference is that startups and small businesses give people a more comfortable narrative of how their life is going. It is a lot more comforting to tell yourself, "I'm doing badly now so I will do better in the future," than "I'll never get a job that pays as well as my parents." If this was not the case, there would be much less romanticization of venture capital and angel investment on these boards, more startups would be focused on revenue-generating than traction-generating products, and lifestyle businesses would not be perceived as failures of boldness for "not swinging for the fences".