Yeah there's a lot of rationalizing going on here, the investors have more generous terms because they have a lot of market power compared to anybody else at the company, nothing more, nothing less. It doesn't necessarily correlate with risks.

This is a naive and simplistic view that immediately breaks down in the face of individual freedom. Founders are not forced to take investment, nor are investors force to make it. Terms must be negotiated.

You can say liquidation preference should be forbidden, but that's a slippery slope. Many founders accept a liquidation for larger valuation, and many deals would not happen without it. I'm not sure why we would draw the moral line here since the risk of founding and joining startups exists either way.

I’m a bootstrapped founder but hard disagree with this take.

Surely it can’t be the founder taking home a healthy salary from day 1 despite the company being far away from any revenue at all that is taking the risk in your book?

It absolutely is. The typical SV investor is risking essentially nothing - a portion of their wealth that does not make a meaningful difference for their standard of living. And they are free to do whatever they like while they wait for their investment to play out. The founder, on the other hand, is risking years of their one life (and probably their one YOUTH) - years that could have been spent in a myriad other ways.