Look at finance for more data. I personally know many successful traders and managers who live very quiet, middle class lives despite having the means to do mu

Look at finance for more data. I personally know many successful traders and managers who live very quiet, middle class lives despite having the means to do much more (usually because they get their kicks off business success, not consumption). Cf stereotype of the Swiss billionaire in jeans driving a beaten up Volvo. The head of a derivatives desk in the London HQ of a global bank used to drive a 10 year old hatchback to the office and lived in Zone 2 or 3 in the same house he bought as an immigrant with his first years' savings. Obviously, these guys don't appear in press releases. I would argue they are also relatively rare. However, on the work hard play hard side, you can name literally hundreds of Gordon Gekko types like S. Cohen who bought Hirst's famous $8m stuffed shark or S. Schwarzman who likes to put his name on entire museum wings around the world. Some very driven people have more intense fun on the side and the only thing that matters to the VC/FOF is a. the possible ROIs under different scenarios and b. the probability of each happening; to calculate the NPV and therefore desirability of the investment. Some of the more extreme characters from this world are documented in "Richistan" [1] and "The $12m stuffed shark" [2]. The common trait amongst the "nouveau riche" is that they are intensely focused and good at their work, not letting their fun permeate. If I had spare capital right now, I would happily take the other side of your trade; I'm pretty sure that spending behaviour (hard fun, tendency to consumerism, whatever you want to formalize it as), all else being equal, is not predictive of success, just as with race, gender and maybe even education or age (adjusted for experience). As for the original subject, I think a lot of people who grew up well off or have had a few years to build some security do not realize how valuable those early marginal dollars are to someone without connections and a rich daddy. A "normal" person might well take 5 years to save the $100-200k necessary for a safe bootstrap; if they fail, they're back to the grind for another 5, delaying kids and life accordingly. It is perfectly rational for the founders to attempt to circumvent that if the market generously offers the opportunity, by taking out enough cash for a few trials should this one not work out. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Richistan-Journey-Through-American-Wealth/dp/0307341453 http://www.amazon.com/Richistan-Journey-Through-American-Wea... [2] http://www.amazon.com/The-Million-Stuffed-Shark-Contemporary/dp/0230620590/ http://www.amazon.com/The-Million-Stuffed-Shark-Contemporary...