Jesus christ, really? That sounds like a hideous childhood to me. Is this what we're becoming, a race of people obsessed with capital and business and work?
Go play in the dirt and ride your bike, kid. Work when you're old.
Some people fear we code up a Paperclip Maximizer, but it could be that we'll accidentally build one in pursuit of profits.
Some terrifyingly large proportion of the money markets runs on pure code already - which is terrifying because we're not even a democracy now, but some kind of bizarre automated profit-seeking cybernetic metacreature.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/13/opinion/sunday/the-entrepr...
Trading anything with your friends (cards, etc) is a business, especially if those trades make the value of your collection go up or down. Buying these items new (cards in a pack) could sort of be an investment scheme.
If you held onto anything worth money from your childhood, you could call that a buy and hold scheme.
Creating in-game value by trading, selling and acquiring items in an MMORPG is a business if you could cash out that value through trading sites.
Some kids sell weed and other illegal items.
> Trading anything with your friends (cards, etc) is a business, especially if those trades make the value of your collection go up or down. Buying these items new (cards in a pack) could sort of be an investment scheme.
> If you held onto anything worth money from your childhood, you could call that a buy and hold scheme.
> Creating in-game value by trading, selling and acquiring items in an MMORPG is a business if you could cash out that value through trading sites.
The capacity of some posters on this board to redefine simple and well known words into something entirely different in order to fit a very warped vision of things never ceases to amaze me.
Keep in mind that we are referring to children (under the age of 18.) These sorts of transactions are often the first steps into the realization that you can grow value (which could be physical or virtual items) through transactions with others (this could be smart trading or selling something you created.) These first steps could be powerful lessons which may shape their future.
If I sell a baseball card and I make a profit, then that profit would likely be recorded on a Schedule C (Form 1040), Profit or Loss From Business.
http://www.irs.gov/uac/Schedule-C-(Form-1040),-Profit-or-Los...
Just by selling that card, you are a sole proprietorship.
If you get creative, you can think of many different ways in which children participate in business activity.
ETA: Okay, I get it. My examples aren't of people starting companies. A kid selling baseball cards might be a business, but not a company (company is a group, more than one.) I wonder if that's what he actually meant though. Can a minor even hire employees?
For anyone that wants to be a rich founder, almost sensible but definitely effective workaholism can help. The main issue is that only a few people are motivated enough (irrespective of vesting schedule and equity share classes) to get shit done while everyone else wants to look busy or shift work to those sort of folks. They have a name: dead weight freeloaders. Be the fast, effective shit doer because there's no room in awesome for sloppy, lazy crap and excuses like retail employees try to pass off every day.