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Adding on to the culture -

1. Even if your idea seems crappy, investors will give you millions to bootstrap it. Uber, Twitter, Doordash, AirBnB, Coinbase, Instacart - all sounded funny before they became billion dollar behemoths.

2. Social norm of hire fast, fire fast - allow startups to quickly scale if they sense some opportunity and quickly ramp down in case that doesn't pan out. Again, different countries have different trade-offs around this. But the American tradeoff makes it much easier to build and grow a startup.

There's no reward for being JUST ambitious in the US, there's a lot more involved. Luck and willingness to exploit the work of others is a big part of what's required to earn the reward.

Are you under the impression that being ambitious is looked down upon in Germany or anywhere else outside of a bunch of dictatorships?