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Comment by Infernal | Hacker News Reader

I normally agree with the tone of this, but between 1 and 2 I noticed - how many people are there out there really that have ever taken an enormous risk with extremely high upside?

I certainly never have, and neither has anyone I know.

Maybe the 1 in 500 million should be a bit better odds, considering how few people decide not to "play the game" to begin with?

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It's much easier to take "enormous risks" when you've got a golden parachute. For 99% of people taking huge risks means career, financial or literal suicide and (at best) poverty for their loved ones.

Or I guess put another way, most people are too busy trying to survive to think about playing the game.

How many refugees are there? I'd say that's a lower bound for you.

Usually, those "enormous risks" require risking destitution, followed by ill health and death. Pulling the following statements out of my ass: you get approximately one of those per life, on average. People are hesitant to go looking for these "opportunities" and are content to let them come in their own time.

Last time I checked, many tech billionaires did not take huge risks. Zuck and Gates were already at Harvard, and they could always return there if FB/Microsoft failed (with upper-middle class families to fund their education). Page and Brin were similarly Ph.D candidates at Stanford. They almost certainly would not have died/faced destitution if Google had failed.

If your startup failing really meant death or destitution, why don’t we ever hear about the high death rates of YC founders who fail (or startup founders in general)?

Because all those people had enough built-up privilege to not have to suffer dire consequences. That's not an option for most folks...

In this context, the 1 in 500 million doesn't mean that there are 500 million other people to compete with - it's the chance of a huge success. So the number of other people trying it isn't relevant.

Yeah, I guess it was the phrasing "1 in 500 million _for whom_" that got me thinking in terms of absolute numbers who make the attempt.

Sounded more like sarcasm to me, but I could be wrong.

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