[epicureanideal]

And that’s why I’m asking, where would those better workplaces be? I’ve worked at quite a few companies at this point, and although it’s true that some teams are better than others, the general pattern has been that incentives are not well aligned in any company I’ve seen.

Any company with proper alignment of incentives would crush the majority of existing startups. But as I said, such a company won’t be funded.

The winners in the current economy are those with access to huge buckets of capital rather than those who can most effectively deploy that capital. And if they’re only competing against others with huge buckets of capital but not highly effective strategies, then they all compete at that same low level of strategy.

Imagine a situation where you have dozens of restaurants all run by people who are mediocre but semi competent chefs and mediocre but semi competent business people. Meanwhile you have great chefs and great business people working a few steps beneath them. And yet the first group has access to buckets of capital to start restaurants and hire people and the second group doesn’t have the right connections. That’s what the software industry looks like to me after a long time working in it.

No problem, start your own. Except the first group with access to buckets of capital will be able to advertise far more, keep prices cheaper, and so on, so you’ll be out competed in the marketplace despite better skills simply due to their access to huge amounts of money. Even if you are far more effective at deploying the smaller amount of capital you have.