<story><title>Tech investors can’t get enough of Europe’s fizzing startup scene</title><url>https://www.economist.com/business/tech-investors-cant-get-enough-of-europes-fizzing-startup-scene/21806435</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>yoran</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s paradoxical that entrepreneurship is less of a thing in the EU than in the US. After all, Europeans can afford a lot more risk than Americans. There&amp;#x27;s a strong safety net in the form of social security. Health insurance is not tied to your employer. European university graduates don&amp;#x27;t start with lives with several $100k in debt, while having gotten an education of similar quality. Maybe the culture is shifting?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>zemvpferreira</author><text>There is no paradox, only innocence. Did you know here in Portugal company directors used to be personally liable for social security payments for a business&amp;#x27;s employees in case of bankruptcy, until the end of their former contract? That meant for every engineer you hire, you might easily be on the hook for 10K with the government in case you go under. Try failing fast with that.&lt;p&gt;America was built in part by swindlers and robber-barons in a system who let them get away with it by design. In many of Europe&amp;#x27;s different legislations, failure in the bankruptcy way has&amp;#x2F;had serious consequences for the business person responsible. Play fast and loose with your responsibilities like you might in the US, confident that the corporate veil will bail you as long as you don&amp;#x27;t do anything criminal, and you might find yourself staring down the barrel of a loaded fiscal gun.</text></comment>
<story><title>Tech investors can’t get enough of Europe’s fizzing startup scene</title><url>https://www.economist.com/business/tech-investors-cant-get-enough-of-europes-fizzing-startup-scene/21806435</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>yoran</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s paradoxical that entrepreneurship is less of a thing in the EU than in the US. After all, Europeans can afford a lot more risk than Americans. There&amp;#x27;s a strong safety net in the form of social security. Health insurance is not tied to your employer. European university graduates don&amp;#x27;t start with lives with several $100k in debt, while having gotten an education of similar quality. Maybe the culture is shifting?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>TTPrograms</author><text>1) Less upside for entrepreneurs&amp;#x2F;investors&amp;#x2F;early employees due to tax policy,&lt;p&gt;2) greater hiring&amp;#x2F;firing friction due to stronger employee protections,&lt;p&gt;3) greater fixed operating costs&amp;#x2F;overhead all around due to increased incorporation costs&amp;#x2F;bureaucratic requirements.&lt;p&gt;I don&amp;#x27;t think these things are necessarily negative, but in a world with competition between markets with high incorporation friction and low incorporation friction you&amp;#x27;d expect entrepreneurship to concentrate in lower friction markets.</text></comment>