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Comment by jondwillis | Hacker News Reader

Tech job market is fucked because rates aren’t zero and money isn’t free for the first time in like 15 years.

Middle class continued to be crushed, everyone noticed that tech was the only way to have a shot at upper middle class, and rushed for the same doors.

The “extras” that weren’t making the cut got let go last year and even harder this year.

The only way to win is to stop playing the game. Make your own company. Get a loan from the SBA. Fuck the disgusting wanna live forever VC extractions class. Get out of the rat race. Stop rewarding the cancerous leeches that are dismantling everything else so they can go do cocaine in Mykonos. Stop playing their game.

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Do you actually have experience behind the advice you are giving? What you are suggesting is a terrible idea for most people. For a time, I used to think about that. Getting an SBA loan is really not as easy as people on the internet claim. Most companies fail, and a company that is founded with the premise of "leaving the rat race", as opposed to an idea that brings genuine value, is even more likely to fail and leave the owner in a worse position.

Better advice would be to consider changing or shifting skills towards something that's in greater demand right now and find ways of meeting people who can connect the OP with a job. Given that they are living with a friend, I don't think they have the leeway to start a business (and likely fail).

> The only way to win is to stop playing the game. Make your own company

I don’t have the time nor the resources to do that now. If I could get a job that would allow me to stabilize a bit, then I could start thinking about that.

SBA loan! Friends and family loan. You’ll get a job, feel stabler and safer for awhile, and be too tired to work on other stuff until the next time you’re in the same boat.

This is ridiculous advice, what is someone supposed to do with a loan? You can't just "business" out of thin air. You'll just be paying interest rates or worse.

It's TikTok advice, the classic:

- open an LLC to protect your -$10,000 in assets

- open lines of credit using the LLC (don't worry about what a Paydex is)

- ???

https://www.tiktok.com/@moneytips.tt/video/72389957727446663...

This sounds like a neat infinite money trick, are these the right steps?

- Open LLC

- Take out huge, collateralized SBA loan

- ???

- Profit?

Needs one more step to transition from meme to reality:

- Open LLC - Take out huge, collateralized SBA loan - ??? - Profit? - ???

The first ??? represents all the steps and actions. The second ??? represents all the consequences.

You're getting some rather pessimistic replies.

But I get what you're saying --you're saying, get funds together by any means necessary (SBA is a straightforward path) and bootstrap/found a company.

It's still certainly possible to start up a software business. Basically the business needs to provide enough value to customers that they'll pay for it, and what they pay needs to cover the costs of the business.

That is profitability (which is something even many large VC-backed tech companies have totally forgotten how to do).

Software businesses can be started with low costs...

I'll probably get the same pessimistic replies, but this is definitely a valid path for the brave and competent.

Some of the pessimism may be from really competent folks who realize that a business environment that is so hostile that companies that essentially have infinite money compared to you start tightening their belts and let you go then won't rehire you...

...may not be the best environment to go and start taking out loans to open your own business. Especially not for a micro-SaaS where profit margins should be something like 80 something percent on a terrible day.

SBA loans are better matched for opening a business where your margins are in the single digits and you need to pay vendors X weeks out before you can make a single sale. Not selling software you can write for $0 and host on a $10 VPS.

Brave and competent do not need his advice in the first place. Others will end in debt with no job nor company. Building a company is full time job with it's competences...

I look forward to tomorrow's Ask HN: "I started a business, where are all the clients at?"

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