Working at a startup is overrated, both financially and emotionally
I think this is a really good article, but I think that one of the things it misses is that a huge reason the math works out so badly for startup employees is because founders and VCs take the lion&#x27;s share of the gains.<p>I mean, in my experience at startups, founders typically own around 40% of the equity. The option pool for <i>all other employees</i> is around 10-20%.<p>Now, I certainly believe startup founders deserve far more equity than anyone else, but this highlights that the risk&#x2F;reward trade-off <i>really only makes sense for founders</i>. I mean, what founders risk in terms of opportunity costs and lower wages is usually only slightly more than very early stage employees, but their reward is ~10-30x. The reward, in rare cases, may also make sense for C level hires at proven startups that are already growing like gangbusters, because they&#x27;ll get a ton of equity. For rank-and-file, though, the issue is that <i>even if the startup hits</i> it usually becomes more like a nice bonus than life defining wealth.