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Comment by davemc500hats | Hacker News Reader

there are obvious rqmts to qualify that require time and effort in addition to capital, and a track record of investment over at least 3 years and 6 previous companies.

there are obvious penalties which would be incurred if someone intentionally abused this system.

legislation does not prevent all types of abuse, however we have attempted to reasonably make it unlikely that such abuse would not occur without great cost and risk to the perpetrators.

we believe we have done a responsible job in drafting the legislation to avoid this. exact language will depend on how the bill gets negotiated before final vote.

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So, again, requiring a track record of investment over at east 3 years and 6 companies might (for instance) exclude Warren Buffet, and keeping the requirements loose means that virtually anyone can "sponsor" an "entrepreneur" for very little money and get them 3 years residency in the US.

This just doesn't seem well thought out.

seriously dude, do you like to argue for no particular reason?

yes, it's likely not all investors will qualify -- not perfect, but it's reasonable to require some domain experience that can be provably audited. and yes, the investors who do qualify will likely not be completely sketchy and/or likely to commit fraud.

we picked a reasonable bar to get over that straddles both a rqmt of experience and some capital without making it so low that people could abuse it.

investing $300,000 in capital in 6 companies over 3 years does NOT seem like "virtually anyone" for "very little money".

your perspective again seems irrational & extreme.

My perspective is that the "investor sponsorship" component of this bill is arbitrary, unfair, and will distort the market. I've been pretty consistent about this point throughout the whole "argument".

If you don't want to continue arguing, stop arguing. I don't care what bar you picked for investors, except for the fact that it seems obvious that it's modelled on the tech investor clique. If you got the investor model perfect, I'd still have a problem with conflating investment with viability or value to the economy.

I don't believe for one millisecond that you will concede anything about this bill, which you clearly passionately support. That doesn't bother me at all, for what it's worth.

i'm conceding about as much as you are, except i'm arguing from specific economic goals & benefits. you're arguing about "distortions" that appear to be subjective analysis.

if you want to have a discussion where we have the chance to change each others' minds, then perhaps we should be talking about what parts of investor mentality are in question, and why that isn't better than doing nothing / status quo.

Is the 2 $50k investment's cumulative? In other words, someone like pg makes a lot of small investments. He is obviously included in the kinds of investors you're trying to select with this bill, but would he meet this requirement?

I think it should say at least 2 investments, and at least $100k in total value of the investments.

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