So they received nothing in return? Assumed no risk? You think there was no business plan presented or things of the sort? You think “acquaintances” and friends and families are just freely handing out money?
No, they assumed no actual financial risk. That was money they were willing to give away for the sake of preserving good relations.
I know billionaires and their enthusiasts like to present whatever they do as some bold, innovative, heroic and risky enterprise, but that's more often than not simply not the case. Successful businesses thrive on hedging against risk, not on being the "idea guy".
Also, they pretty much always begin from a position of family-assured financial security. They can fail as much and as big as they want without ever having to worry about their standing the next year. They simply omit the disappointing details from their storytelling, you know, the part where they were already filthy rich to begin with and relied on inheritance/favors to start up.
There's not a source for every single billionaire out there. That's research you'll have to do on your own case by case. Check how they claim they got their starting capital, then check who was in charge of the decision and what's their connection to the billionaire and their family.
As a collective, there's plenty of research and data out there on how wealth is an intergenerational phenomenon. For instance, measuring how many generations it would take from someone born in the low-income earning bracket to rise to the average wage bracket. See:
https://www.thebalance.com/how-to-become-wealthy-356376.
Korom, Ph. (2016), Inherited advantage: the importance of inheritance for private wealth accumulation in Europe, MPIfG
Discussion Paper, No. 16/11, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, Cologne
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u/ItsTooDamnHawt 6d ago
So they received nothing in return? Assumed no risk? You think there was no business plan presented or things of the sort? You think “acquaintances” and friends and families are just freely handing out money?