It could be kids, not age, that make a startup less likely
July 10th, 2007Someone was telling me that there is an age cutoff for founding a startup. According to an article from Psychology Today forwarded to me by another friend, it’s not the age that matters, it’s having kids.. and therefore needing to focus on their upbringing, which pulls an entrepreneur away from his or her startup dreams.
In every society at all historical times, the tendency to commit crimes and other risk-taking behavior rapidly increases in early adolescence, peaks in late adolescence and early adulthood, rapidly decreases throughout the 20s and 30s, and levels off in middle age.
This curve is not limited to crime. The same age profile characterizes every quantifiable human behavior that is public
…
The cost of competition, however, rises dramatically when a man has children, when his energies and resources are put to better use protecting and investing in them. The birth of the first child usually occurs several years after puberty because men need some time to accumulate sufficient resources and attain sufficient status to attract their first mate. There is therefore a gap of several years between the rapid rise in the benefits of competition and similarly rapid rise in its costs. Productivity rapidly declines in late adulthood as the costs of competition rise and cancel its benefits.
Some interesting food for thought in that article. I had the pleasure to work with Jo and Lawrence from Psychology Today, back in my Health days. Not only are they extremely nice fellows, but they know how to create compelling content.