The title of this article is an understatement. I&#x27;m a startup founder in Europe and we&#x27;ve been treading water for a year. How is a company supposed to get off the ground if nobody has a hand that is able to be reached out to any of us.<p>The government made it easier for startups to get loans from the bank. But they did it the same disastrous way as the housing market crash started. You can get a loan, the government takes a lot of the risk away from the bank. But you still have to pay it all back. All that means is that people are getting loans who shouldn&#x27;t.<p>There isn&#x27;t even a path through immigration. You&#x27;re much more likely to be able to stay in Europe if you get a job. Otherwise they just won&#x27;t let you in.<p>There aren&#x27;t any investors here. When we look for investors, we have paid for tickets into large conferences and met leaders, owners, of Venture Capital organisations. There is a point where commonly they tell you after jumping through their hoops they do not have money. They say, we can give you 20k€ for x amount of equity where x is a two digit number. Everywhere you turn there are vultures, preying on startups. I get grilled by people promising to hook me up with investors all the time. People wearing business suits and trolling tech meetups only 5k€ for their help! They know people. Paid upfront.<p>Taxes are higher if you own your own company than if you simply have a job somewhere. Every single thing works against you. If a year ago we were able to hit the market we had 0 competitors, now we have 2.