When the author writes out all the sacrifices needed, it makes it look incredibly hard. And, in fact, starting a startup is in general a very long slog. What makes it worth while is the prospect of asymmetric returns (either in money or in future freedom).
If you had asked my mom at age 30 (before she had me), "What would you do if you had enough money that you didn't have to work?". She would have probably said something like: "Well, I would have kids and stay at home and take care of them. As they grew up, I would love to work more with the catholic church, because that means a lot to me." And in fact, my mom ended up not needing to work, and doing exactly that. But she did not need to make the sacrifices Jessica lists above, nor did spend four years schlepping away at a startup. Instead she just got married to solid, hard working fellow who was happy to be the primary breadwinner.
So perhaps one reason women don't do startups as much, is because they do not need to. It's still far more socially normal for the guy to be the primary breadwinner, and many guys are very willing to work and have their wife stay at home. Since women have a greater ability to leave the workforce or opt out of lousy job (since their family is less dependent on their pay check), women have less of a need to pin their hopes on a risky startup in order to escape the rat race.
Excellent point. I'm surprised that I've never heard this rational before. Compared to the other theories, this is definitely the Occam's Razor version. For many women there is a good chance that their future husband will be the "breadwinner"... What's the point of compressing 40 years of work into 4, if you aren't planning on working 40 to begin with?
Good job of posting the bleeding obvious but politically incorrect truth.
All of the women I know who are full-time mothers do so out of personal choice. Most left careers of some type or another to do so.
Obviously there are exceptions to this rule, but there remains a large amount of families out there where the man is happy to bring in the money and the woman is happy to look after the kids. It's still the mainstream family model, even if the mother is working, it's usually for financial rather than career-aspiration reasons.
I do hope this post leads someone out there to make the big jump. A world with a female version of Zuckerberg out there would be a very interesting one indeed.
My favorite was the gorgeous 29 year-old chief resident in pediatrics who said it's strictly a back-up plan: she's marrying a neurosurgeon and has no plans to work after residency. Um . . . Do you think the admissions committees would have committed the social resources of a coveted medical school seat (only 45% of applicants ever get in, and the total cost of the education is around $400,000 per seat) or residency (her training involves other people dying) if she put that in her personal statement?!
Yes, the sacrifices are the lead points in that article.
Folks who actually found/join startups are ignorant of/don't care about the sacrifices. Save enough to be comfortable? What's wrong with crashing on a couch, living in the office/a friend's basement, eating ramen?
I think the article is very telling. Women (that woman at any rate) won't consider a job that is uncomfortable.
Yes, there may be reasons for THAT, but the comfort issue is at the heart.
And, for some of us, the asymmetric return is not really the biggest part of the value proposition. Its the control, the innovation, the environment that appeals. We use many excuses but stim-junkies and thrill-seekers are what they are.
If you had asked my mom at age 30 (before she had me), "What would you do if you had enough money that you didn't have to work?". She would have probably said something like: "Well, I would have kids and stay at home and take care of them. As they grew up, I would love to work more with the catholic church, because that means a lot to me." And in fact, my mom ended up not needing to work, and doing exactly that. But she did not need to make the sacrifices Jessica lists above, nor did spend four years schlepping away at a startup. Instead she just got married to solid, hard working fellow who was happy to be the primary breadwinner.
So perhaps one reason women don't do startups as much, is because they do not need to. It's still far more socially normal for the guy to be the primary breadwinner, and many guys are very willing to work and have their wife stay at home. Since women have a greater ability to leave the workforce or opt out of lousy job (since their family is less dependent on their pay check), women have less of a need to pin their hopes on a risky startup in order to escape the rat race.