The game is rigged. But that merely makes it less likely that someone who's on the wrong side can succeed, not impossible. You do have to do as much as you can, with what you're given, regardless of what it is.
The real key, though, is that this tells us what we, as a society, need to change. If we genuinely value entrepreneurship and innovation, we need to create a universal safety net that lets people take risks, try things, and fail, again and again, without ending up destitute, because we know that is what leads to eventually creating a successful business.
Isn’t this what limited liability corporations help ensure?
People need a way to limit downsides, not have zero downside.
It’s like giving a student a service chance at a test to help ensure they learn the material. But giving them unlimited attempts with no risk doesn’t create the same environment.
LLCs let you avoid having personal liability for accidents, corporate malfeasance, etc. They don't let you avoid having to invest your own money into the company to try to make it go, because no one else cares enough about your idea to do so, then lose it all if it fails.
Having something like universal basic income absolutely does not reduce the risk to zero. What it does is it reduces the penalty for failure—failure which is often largely out of your hands. Rather than such failures meaning you lose your life savings, have no job, and are months/weeks/days from homelessness, they would mean you are making only the minimum needed to sustain housing, food, and clothing. For most people, particularly those of the type to try starting their own business, that still won't be enough to be happy.
The threat of death by exposure and starvation should not be what drives us to do better. We, as a society, should have moved past that already.
LLCs do provide limitations towards losing your life savings or home. They create a buffer between personal and corporate assets. I think a key difference is the benefits are targeted towards those who are trying to create value, whereas UBI is much less targeted. At least from an economic sense, LLCs seem like a much more efficient mechanism.
Sure, they prevent you losing those things if the company loses more money than it has and the creditors want to come after you personally.
They don't prevent you losing those things if you invested your life savings in the company, and you mortgaged your home to invest more. Which are both things that people trying to get companies off the ground do, especially if they don't otherwise have the means to do so.
If you're considering the primary purpose of a UBI as being encouraging entrepreneurship, then sure, they're not that efficient. I do not consider that to be its primary purpose, nor have I yet spoken to anyone who does. It is one of many, many benefits to a UBI that should be considered.
The game is rigged. But that merely makes it less likely that someone who's on the wrong side can succeed, not impossible. You do have to do as much as you can, with what you're given, regardless of what it is.
The real key, though, is that this tells us what we, as a society, need to change. If we genuinely value entrepreneurship and innovation, we need to create a universal safety net that lets people take risks, try things, and fail, again and again, without ending up destitute, because we know that is what leads to eventually creating a successful business.