Is working at a startup risky? No.

What a silly article. Citing length-of-employment numbers doesn't prove anything. There is a world of difference between upgrading your job from one company to another or pursuing a different line of work of your own volition, and losing your source of sustenance because your company has no money. Even if 100% of employment changes in large companies were due to involuntary loss of the job, it would still be less risky than startups, because 3.4 years is a hell of a long time to be able to survive in a cash-poor startup.

A startup means removing yourself from an established cashflow, reliable funding, and steady paychecks. This is risky, especially if you have dependents.

If startups weren't risky, everyone would do them. The potential reward is massively larger than an 8-to-5 at Megacorp. If the risk of a startup was the same as being in an established company, then literally nobody of any intelligence whatsoever would work at a large company, because the potential payoff for a startup is orders of magnitude higher.

The idea that startups aren't risky (or that corporate jobs are just as risky) is flat-out wrong, and is a dangerous thing to be telling to people who don't otherwise know better.

Startups are wonderful. They cause massive, explosive personal growth and have the potential for tremendous financial upside. They're also exceptionally risky, which is a large part of the reason that the unfunded startup is primarily the young person's game - once you have real-life responsibilities like a spouse, children, a house payment, etc, it may not be an acceptable one, unless you're prepared to sacrifice your house and your family's quality of life in a worst-case scenario.