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It sounds like he put in no money of his own.

He would not have made $3.7M without the hard work of his employees. And yet when it came down to it, he took almost all the money for himself.

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If he worked for free, he _did_ put in money of his own. So it depends on what his salary cut was, and for how long. I've been thinking of starting a company for ages, but there's no escaping this fact -- I have to give up a substantial amount of money, and the most likely scenario is my company won't take off (much less make a profit, and even less an exit). I agree employees should be compensated but ultimately, if they get a salary on day one, it is a very different calculation. I've worked as an early stage employee, and the salary cut I took was ~30% for ~1 year. I may get a payout from that, perhaps 1-5x and to me that seems a pretty reasonable balance. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Those jobs that the employees chose to take would not have existed without Josh actually starting the business. He created something. He took the initiative to be a builder and took the risk and responsibility that comes along with that. The investors wrote a check that amounts to peanuts for them. The employees put in their 8hr days and collected a regular paycheck. The founder is the person who deserves the payout here.

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