It's a losing proposition, financially speaking. But it sure is a lot more fun and satisfying working at a startup than a large corporation.
Maybe. However, I think most us know people that love working for Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Google, et al.
Frankly, I think your independence claim is overstated—financial support is crucial. Shigeru Miyamoto emphasized this perspective in a 2012 New Yorker profile: “There’s a big difference between the money you receive personally from the company and the money you can use in your job.”
There’re many reasons to found a startup, very few to work for one.
There are good startups out there. I'm almost notorious for startup-bashing because so many of them have awful cultures, but there are decent small/new companies out there. You'll probably have to look outside of VC-istan. VC-istan seems to appeal to the Clueless (see: MacLeod hierarchy) young who will jump at the chance to work "at a startup!" without discrimination.
I know someone who's actually looking at building a startup without equity. He will hold 100% of the stock, at least at first. Variable pay will be profit-sharing. He wants this company to last 20+ years without acquisition, so instead of putting the focus on a future cash-out, he wants people to be rewarded continually for good work.
I think that, as a young engineer, you also have to ask yourself why you want to work at a start-up. Is it to get rich? In that case you should be working somewhere that can teach you the ropes on your way to launching your own start-up (and even then you might be better served working somewhere you can get some domain expertise to separate you from all the fresh college grads). Is it to learn a lot and get a lot of responsibility? In that case you might consider small engineering firms that have moved out of the start-up stage and have real revenues coming in and can offer market salaries and full benefits. You won't get meaningful equity at a place like this, but you won't get that at most start-ups either. If you want to get in on the ground level of a growing organization, consider companies that aren't going the usual angel/VC route. I worked at a "out of the founder's basement" start-up that had some cost-plus contracts, and so could offer market salaries and benefits immediately. Again, no real equity in a situation like that, but on the flip side you know you'll still have a job in a year. And don't overlook working at a big faceless corporation just because it's not cool. Big organizations have the resources to actually train you, they have internal tracks for your career progression, they offer pretty good job security, etc.
He hasn't started it yet. He's bootstrapping. He plans on paying market to slightly above, and being generous with annual bonuses (the profit-sharing).
Wall Street gets a bad rap for its bonuses, and there are some cultural problems with it, but it's a better mechanism for compensation than what VC-istan uses. Also, I think that Wall Street culture is less horrible than VC-istan. On Wall Street, some people get butthurt about their bonuses, but you don't have teams of 15 programmers where every single one is trying to become VP/Eng and get a real slice.
I've read a lot of your writing and agree with some of it.
Bootstrapping is attractive, but it's very hard to do. Also, as misguided as employee equity grants might be, it has become the standard for compensation in SV; that a company doesn't offer some token ownership definitely will make it harder to hire.
I think it really boils down to, if you want to take part in "VC-istan" as a founder/employee, move to SF, if not, go somewhere else, because it's just too hard to hire/hold down an office/live in SF on bootstrapping.
Maybe. However, I think most us know people that love working for Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Google, et al.
Frankly, I think your independence claim is overstated—financial support is crucial. Shigeru Miyamoto emphasized this perspective in a 2012 New Yorker profile: “There’s a big difference between the money you receive personally from the company and the money you can use in your job.”
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/12/20/101220fa_fact_...
There’re many reasons to found a startup, very few to work for one.