4 ms·

SO WHAT ? these numbers are pointless. I get it, they're trying to say that entrepreneurs are not unwashed hardened singles with no chance at a meaningful famil

by sami36 14y ago

SO WHAT ? these numbers are pointless. I get it, they're trying to say that entrepreneurs are not unwashed hardened singles with no chance at a meaningful family life. I think this is misguided on so many levels. 1- Marriage is not an end goal for everybody. Sorry. Actually, the proliferation of divorces, close to 50 % despite the extremely high barrier of exit from that transaction should give you an idea. That's not even taking affairs into the equation. 2- So is having children, not that there is anything wrong with having kids. but the notion that not having kids is missing out on anything is false. The essence of entrepreneurship is disruption, it's time our social norms evolve from their 50s fantasies & catch up with the reality of modern life.

jacquesm 14y ago
> The essence of entrepreneurship is disruption No, it really isn't. It's about getting $Y out for every $X in where Y > X, and doing that in a sustainable and preferably an ethical manner. Disruption is the exception, not the rule in entrepreneurship, and success is simply (Y/X) * volume processed * lifespan of project. Some would even say that success is the net cumulative effect on society but that's a lot harder to measure. You could for instance make this about jobs created or amount donated to charity or something like that but most people simply use the formula above or some variation on it.
- sami36 14y ago
  I beg to disagree. I think you're conflating entrepreneurship with business. an entrepreneur would only assume the rather significant risk if the likelihood of payout (as denoted by your clever equations)is high enough. in a capitalistic society such as ours with millions of established businesses that would entail either 1 of these two options. 1- Make the way things are done normally, better. (Fedex vs USPS) 2-Do a completely new different thing (Facebook.) Both options are disruptive, although at different levels.
  - jacquesm 14y ago
    > I think you're conflating entrepreneurship with business. And I think you're conflating competition with disruption. Entrepreneurship and business go hand in hand, you can't have the one without the other. Someone that risks their personal fortune to open a hamburger stand by your definition is not an entrepreneur, by my definition he or she is. And that's before we look at the possible futures where that hamburger stand ends up as a chain of stores because he innovated on quality or was exceptional in service. Disruption is not Fedex vs USPS, it's not Facebook competing with myspace for eyeballs. Disruption is AirBNB threatening the established interests in the hospitality industry, napster making record execs very worried and EasyJet causing increased blood pressure with all their fat cat competitors. Disruption by definition can only come when a market is established, but it is definitely not a prerequisite for entrepreneurship or running a successful business.
    - sami36 14y ago
      I duly note that you don't think that either Facebook or Fedex are disruptive. by that definition of disruption, sure. Entrepreneurship is not disruptive. I rest my case
  - flyinRyan 14y ago
    You forgot about a very big #3: find something that's working elsewhere and adapt it for a new, local audience. Lot's of countries have their own "ebay", for example and ebay tended to buy the best ones. There are endless possibilities out there to make a business and most of them are not disruptive at all. The disruptive ones are vastly more risky.
    - sami36 14y ago
      I get your point, but disruption goes beyond concepts. entrepreneurship by way of geographic arbitrage is still disruptive to the local business scene. Whether it's facebook or studiVZ, it's still the same effect.
      - flyinRyan 14y ago
        But in that case your word "disruptive" is so broad as to not be very useful and we already have words that mean this.
- sliverstorm 14y ago
  But where's the catchy buzzwords?
patio11 14y ago
The observation that many successful people have children is not a threat to your social status or happiness. I might suggest saying "Bully for you guys!" and going back to whatever you'd normally be doing.
- sami36 14y ago
  where did the suggestion of a threat come up in my comment ? I'm saying this statistic is pointless not advocating for a lifestyle or another.
  - raphman 14y ago
    It is not clear what your criticism of the study is. Instead, you come across as ranting against findings that conflict with your personal values. As far as I can tell from reading the summary of the study, it does not advocate that being married with children is a better or "the only right way" for founding a business. It just states observations. If you have evidence that the study is biased or made up, please tell us.
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
      - hazov 14y ago
        I believe you're overreacting, this has nothing to do with social mores or whatever, it would be the same as saying that close to 95% of these founders are straight and concluding that non-straight people cannot open a new business, this is not a good way to read the data. If in addition to these 60% that are married and have children and some more 10% that are married but without children I would not say it's pointless. It shows a tendency which we could try to search for a cause. If you see the link the industries cited depends on individual who have good skills and some years of professional experience in the same industry to be managed, this probably means this kind of person just matches the above pattern for founders, meaning that if you define successful founders in the cited industries the same way the researchers did you find probably something not distant from what they found. Just that.
polskibus 14y ago
Don't get angry with the numbers, don't mistake correlation with causation. Entrepreneurs are people who like to build instead of destroy, having a kid may just be a manifestation of that instinct. There are almost no incentives for having a kid these days (esp. in US), the economic climate is barren, and believe it or not, any increase in birth rate, esp. amongst the educated ones will contribute to the country's welfare in the future.
radan 14y ago
I think you might have missed the point of the article, at least the way i see it. IMHO, the point was not to drive home the idea that entrepreneurs that want success should get married and have a child. The main point i got out of it, is that people that want to go into entreprenurship AND also would like to start a family don't have the be afraid that either one of those rules out the other.
maigret 14y ago
>Actually, the proliferation of divorces, close to 50 % It used to be so in 1980. It is not true anymore and has steadily fallen since, for numerous reasons. But this is a deep anchored belief in America. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18600304/ns/us_news-life/t/us-divorce-rate-falls-lowest-level/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18600304/ns/us_news-life/t/us-di...
- sami36 14y ago
  http://www.politifact.com/new-jersey/statements/2012/feb/20/stephen-sweeney/steve-sweeney-claims-more-two-thirds-marriages-end/ http://www.politifact.com/new-jersey/statements/2012/feb/20/... Your article is from 2007, It's still between 40-50 %
  - jasonlotito 14y ago
    You should read the article you so hastily posted. It supports the claim 2007 with a number of 35%. Granted, there are many ranges being thrown out, but the general trend (stated in the article you quote) is that it's well south of 50%, and continuing to move in that direction.
    - sami36 14y ago
      you should have read further , until completion instead of skimming the first part of the article & you would have concluded otherwise.
      - jasonlotito 14y ago
        "Estimates of divorce are around 45%. When you throw in a few percent of couples who separate but never get around to divorcing, the figure of 50% is close," Paul Amato, a professor of family sociology and demography at Pennsylvania State University, wrote in an e-mail. "The probability of divorce is unlikely to rise further. In anything, it appears to be going down slightly." "I think there is some truth to the fact that half of marriages end in divorce," Casey Copen, an associate service fellow with the National Survey of Family Growth, said. But, she said, "it’s just so dependent on the population you’re looking at." For example, studies show couples with higher levels of education are less likely to divorce. Burzumato put the likelihood of marriages now ending in divorce slightly lower, between 35 percent and 45 percent, but said "it might be in the 50s, it’s hard to tell." "What we have found is that divorce rates are coming down," he said. "Cohabitation is on the rise. So those who do select marriage tend to be more committed." The U.S. Census Bureau reported similar findings. "As marriage rates have decreased and cohabitation has become more common, marriage has become more selective of adults who are better off socioeconomically and have more education, and divorce rates have leveled," a May 2011 report said.
adrianhoward 14y ago
SO WHAT ? these numbers are pointless. Well - for a start they act as counter to the argument I see in lots of places in the tech world - here too on occasion - that there is some special advantage to being a young entrepreneur. That doesn't appear to be true. And for those who do value marriage and kids - it helps them see that this isn't a barrier to running a successful new business. It's just data for goodness sake. It's not saying that you should marry and have kids. Indeed I suspect that it's largely a correlation to the age of the successful folk.
philwelch 14y ago
50% of marriages end in divorce, but substantially fewer than 50% of married people end up in a divorce. It's just that the people who get divorced tend to get divorced more than once.

by sami36 14y ago

jacquesm 14y ago

> The essence of entrepreneurship is disruption No, it really isn't. It's about getting $Y out for every $X in where Y > X, and doing that in a sustainable and preferably an ethical manner. Disruption is the exception, not the rule in entrepreneurship, and success is simply (Y/X) * volume processed * lifespan of project. Some would even say that success is the net cumulative effect on society but that's a lot harder to measure. You could for instance make this about jobs created or amount donated to charity or something like that but most people simply use the formula above or some variation on it.

sami36 14y ago
I beg to disagree. I think you're conflating entrepreneurship with business. an entrepreneur would only assume the rather significant risk if the likelihood of payout (as denoted by your clever equations)is high enough. in a capitalistic society such as ours with millions of established businesses that would entail either 1 of these two options. 1- Make the way things are done normally, better. (Fedex vs USPS) 2-Do a completely new different thing (Facebook.) Both options are disruptive, although at different levels.
- jacquesm 14y ago
  > I think you're conflating entrepreneurship with business. And I think you're conflating competition with disruption. Entrepreneurship and business go hand in hand, you can't have the one without the other. Someone that risks their personal fortune to open a hamburger stand by your definition is not an entrepreneur, by my definition he or she is. And that's before we look at the possible futures where that hamburger stand ends up as a chain of stores because he innovated on quality or was exceptional in service. Disruption is not Fedex vs USPS, it's not Facebook competing with myspace for eyeballs. Disruption is AirBNB threatening the established interests in the hospitality industry, napster making record execs very worried and EasyJet causing increased blood pressure with all their fat cat competitors. Disruption by definition can only come when a market is established, but it is definitely not a prerequisite for entrepreneurship or running a successful business.
  - sami36 14y ago
    I duly note that you don't think that either Facebook or Fedex are disruptive. by that definition of disruption, sure. Entrepreneurship is not disruptive. I rest my case
- flyinRyan 14y ago
  You forgot about a very big #3: find something that's working elsewhere and adapt it for a new, local audience. Lot's of countries have their own "ebay", for example and ebay tended to buy the best ones. There are endless possibilities out there to make a business and most of them are not disruptive at all. The disruptive ones are vastly more risky.
  - sami36 14y ago
    I get your point, but disruption goes beyond concepts. entrepreneurship by way of geographic arbitrage is still disruptive to the local business scene. Whether it's facebook or studiVZ, it's still the same effect.
    - flyinRyan 14y ago
      But in that case your word "disruptive" is so broad as to not be very useful and we already have words that mean this.
sliverstorm 14y ago
But where's the catchy buzzwords?

patio11 14y ago

The observation that many successful people have children is not a threat to your social status or happiness. I might suggest saying "Bully for you guys!" and going back to whatever you'd normally be doing.

sami36 14y ago
where did the suggestion of a threat come up in my comment ? I'm saying this statistic is pointless not advocating for a lifestyle or another.
- raphman 14y ago
  It is not clear what your criticism of the study is. Instead, you come across as ranting against findings that conflict with your personal values. As far as I can tell from reading the summary of the study, it does not advocate that being married with children is a better or "the only right way" for founding a business. It just states observations. If you have evidence that the study is biased or made up, please tell us.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
    - hazov 14y ago
      I believe you're overreacting, this has nothing to do with social mores or whatever, it would be the same as saying that close to 95% of these founders are straight and concluding that non-straight people cannot open a new business, this is not a good way to read the data. If in addition to these 60% that are married and have children and some more 10% that are married but without children I would not say it's pointless. It shows a tendency which we could try to search for a cause. If you see the link the industries cited depends on individual who have good skills and some years of professional experience in the same industry to be managed, this probably means this kind of person just matches the above pattern for founders, meaning that if you define successful founders in the cited industries the same way the researchers did you find probably something not distant from what they found. Just that.

polskibus 14y ago

Don't get angry with the numbers, don't mistake correlation with causation. Entrepreneurs are people who like to build instead of destroy, having a kid may just be a manifestation of that instinct. There are almost no incentives for having a kid these days (esp. in US), the economic climate is barren, and believe it or not, any increase in birth rate, esp. amongst the educated ones will contribute to the country's welfare in the future.

radan 14y ago

I think you might have missed the point of the article, at least the way i see it. IMHO, the point was not to drive home the idea that entrepreneurs that want success should get married and have a child. The main point i got out of it, is that people that want to go into entreprenurship AND also would like to start a family don't have the be afraid that either one of those rules out the other.

maigret 14y ago

>Actually, the proliferation of divorces, close to 50 % It used to be so in 1980. It is not true anymore and has steadily fallen since, for numerous reasons. But this is a deep anchored belief in America. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18600304/ns/us_news-life/t/us-divorce-rate-falls-lowest-level/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18600304/ns/us_news-life/t/us-di...

sami36 14y ago
http://www.politifact.com/new-jersey/statements/2012/feb/20/stephen-sweeney/steve-sweeney-claims-more-two-thirds-marriages-end/ http://www.politifact.com/new-jersey/statements/2012/feb/20/... Your article is from 2007, It's still between 40-50 %
- jasonlotito 14y ago
  You should read the article you so hastily posted. It supports the claim 2007 with a number of 35%. Granted, there are many ranges being thrown out, but the general trend (stated in the article you quote) is that it's well south of 50%, and continuing to move in that direction.
  - sami36 14y ago
    you should have read further , until completion instead of skimming the first part of the article & you would have concluded otherwise.
    - jasonlotito 14y ago
      "Estimates of divorce are around 45%. When you throw in a few percent of couples who separate but never get around to divorcing, the figure of 50% is close," Paul Amato, a professor of family sociology and demography at Pennsylvania State University, wrote in an e-mail. "The probability of divorce is unlikely to rise further. In anything, it appears to be going down slightly." "I think there is some truth to the fact that half of marriages end in divorce," Casey Copen, an associate service fellow with the National Survey of Family Growth, said. But, she said, "it’s just so dependent on the population you’re looking at." For example, studies show couples with higher levels of education are less likely to divorce. Burzumato put the likelihood of marriages now ending in divorce slightly lower, between 35 percent and 45 percent, but said "it might be in the 50s, it’s hard to tell." "What we have found is that divorce rates are coming down," he said. "Cohabitation is on the rise. So those who do select marriage tend to be more committed." The U.S. Census Bureau reported similar findings. "As marriage rates have decreased and cohabitation has become more common, marriage has become more selective of adults who are better off socioeconomically and have more education, and divorce rates have leveled," a May 2011 report said.

adrianhoward 14y ago

SO WHAT ? these numbers are pointless. Well - for a start they act as counter to the argument I see in lots of places in the tech world - here too on occasion - that there is some special advantage to being a young entrepreneur. That doesn't appear to be true. And for those who do value marriage and kids - it helps them see that this isn't a barrier to running a successful new business. It's just data for goodness sake. It's not saying that you should marry and have kids. Indeed I suspect that it's largely a correlation to the age of the successful folk.

philwelch 14y ago

50% of marriages end in divorce, but substantially fewer than 50% of married people end up in a divorce. It's just that the people who get divorced tend to get divorced more than once.