From my view it seems factors 'families with money' bring are;<p>- Finance: As per article family financial support can get people over one of the biggest hurdles of getting a business off the ground. Also coming from an upper income family odds are you have a higher income and more savings to invest/risk.<p>- People they grew up around: If you grow up around people owning/running companies you are more likely to see this as a reality for yourself. You also have personalities to emulate in chasing this goal.<p>- History of tech: Wealthier families has more access to tech in the past, although changing today. In my school age most kids didn't have access to their own computer, even at uni. This would be a barrier to leaning about IT that could build future behavior.<p>- Connections: Growing up in a privileged environment you develop connections that can be useful. Also learn how to behave among people who are in a position of power to help you and develop the 'we are similar people' bond.<p>- Sense of Entitlement: A great line from Rory Sutherlands TED talk was Oxford/Cambridge doesn't buy you a great education, it buys you a great sense of entitlement. This give you confidence to go achieve great things. In my small world I have clearly seen this difference from people who grew up on different side of the tracks though it seems to be changing a bit now.<p>- Expectations: People growing up in a more privileged world have higher expectations placed on them. To a degree this can push people to try harder to build something significant rather than just reach a reasonable level of comfort a more general job will offer.<p>- Fallback Option: I imagine this is one of the more important, people from a comfortable family know if their venture goes south they wont be homeless. Their family/friends will make sure they have board, food and an ability to restart. This puts them in a position to risk all with out the same downside.
I have found the opposite for 'vanilla' entrepreneurs; for a few years, I was part of the Young Entrepreneurs Organization (YEO), which collected under-40 founders of businesses with over $1mm in revenue.<p>The Boston chapter had over 100 people in it, maybe closer to 250? Of those, almost none had 'top tier' degrees. Almost none had business school degrees. In fact, for a community of fairly wealthy Bostonians, it was notable how few had come through top-tier schools or advanced degree programs of any sort.<p>Startup entrepreneurs might be different, and I've only read the article about the paper, but I just don't see this in my own entrepreneurial experience; most entrepreneurs I have known outside of Silicon Valley were motivated hard working types; some were visionaries, some were operations geniuses, some accidentally bought out their partners or bosses and got left with a business, most were from blue collar or middle class families.<p>Put another way, Thurston Howell doesn't start a summer painting business staffed by college students, or a recruiting business which demands 90 hour weeks for the first ten years of life; instead Frank from Gloucester does because he can't stomach the thought of working for someone else for the next 40 years.
> We’re in an era of the cult of the entrepreneur. We analyze the Tory Burches and Evan Spiegels of the world looking for a magic formula or set of personality traits that lead to success.<p>No, pop mags like Quartz do. Some entrepreneurs go to trade school and are electricians, deli owners and carpenters. Something like 7%[0] of Americans are self-employed, difficult to believe that many people come from massive wealth.<p>[0]<a href="http://www.careerbuilder.com/share/aboutus/pressreleasesdetail.aspx?sd=2%2F6%2F2014&id=pr802&ed=12%2F31%2F2014" rel="nofollow">http://www.careerbuilder.com/share/aboutus/pressreleasesdeta...</a>
The title is misleading in the extreme: family money is merely one of the available options. You don't have to come from money, you can make your own opportunities by networking, finding investors, and so on.<p>The 1870 - 1920 industrial revolution era of the US disproves this 'entrepreneurs come from families with money' premise. Most people starting businesses at that time came from relative poverty. That includes JD Rockefeller.<p>China's boom of the last 30 years also disproves the family money premise. The radical majority of their millions of entrepreneurs over that time did not come from families with money.
Click bait title imo - article is much softer. Key takeaway is that people are more willing to take risks if they have something to fall back on, which when said out loud, is pretty much a no brainer.
Some people quit their jobs and throw everything into a new, risky venture. This is pretty dangerous, especially for those without wealth. More realistic people work 40-50 hours a week at work and another 40 on their own passions. The smartest find a do-nothing job where they could cash a check for showing up at the office and surfing the net all day (IT, help desk at large organizations) and devote their work time to their own passions.
This article makes little sense. It claims that the average cost to launch a startup is $30k - approximately 1 year of savings for a software engineer working frugally.<p>The article doesn't even begin to support it's claim that family with money is necessary - at most, it seems one needs a frugal lifestyle and a middle class job.
The key concept here is diversification - having more than one source of income. The more of these you have - the less you are affected by risks and market volatility. You have much lower loss-aversion, you could even afford to fail-fast, abandon and start again or just delegate.<p>The simplest example is a landlord having a running businesses in his basements instead of just collecting a rent. These businesses could be seasonal, habit/passion-driven, barely profitable, etc.<p>Btw, a rich family doesn't mean lots-of-money-in-the-bank, it usually means many diversified sources of income.
I think it's more about education - being taught from a young age that entrepreneurship is a possibility and how to manage and make money leads to those people having a higher chance of starting a business.<p>And of course, families that are relatively well off and don't have to worry about basic needs can afford to teach their children that, while poor parents will most likely teach them to be frugal and that having a safe job and not taking big risks is of upmost importance (or not teach them anything - children will notice anyway).
My two favorite go to's on the psychology of founders:<p><a href="https://www.harrisonmetal.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.harrisonmetal.com/</a><p>&&<p><a href="http://blakemasters.com/post/24578683805/peter-thiels-cs183-startup-class-18-notes" rel="nofollow">http://blakemasters.com/post/24578683805/peter-thiels-cs183-...</a>
So people are not risking homelessness and being destitute to setup startups after all? That's a good thing.<p>I think the smartest path for people without financial capital is to spend a decade getting industry experience and getting to know people in whatever field they aspire to disrupt.
This was truer in the past when entrepreneurs had to build physical products or lobby for their business through established family connections of power. Today wealth is less required as long as a proper education can be paid for. Entrepreneurs thrive at Harvard, MIT, Caltec, Berkley, and the like... And software has been the social ladder super express. If Microsoft, google, virgin, facebook, instagram, uber, and apple weren't all started by wealthy entreprenuers then this article is refuted, since those are all the companies we emulate.
It's not nature (genes), it's not nurture (family), and it's not class (inherited wealth). The entrepreneurial spirit is rooted in free-will and individual creativity. Anybody can do it, if and when they want to.
On top of my mind, I don't think Steve Jobs and Larry Ellison came from families with money.<p>Give me two billionaires I and you will see they don't have much in common except tenacity, willpower and seeing the world as something they can influence.<p>I don't think you can learn a lot in analyzing successes, because there are so many different paths to success and chance plays a huge part.<p>Also, IMHO success is more about what you <i>don't</i> do than what you do.<p>But sure helps write articles which drive traffic.