Um, Paul? I’m pretty sure Y Combinator reduces economic inequality

If you were looking for an unpopular opinion to start the year, take a seat because Y Combinator founder Paul Graham has delivered.

I’ve become an expert on how to increase economic inequality, and I’ve spent the past decade working hard to do it. Not just by helping the 2,400 founders YC has funded. I’ve also written essays encouraging people to increase economic inequality and giving them detailed instructions showing how.

He continued:

So when I hear people saying that economic inequality is bad and should be eliminated, I feel rather like a wild animal overhearing a conversation between hunters. But the thing that strikes me most about the conversations I overhear is how confused they are. They don’t even seem clear whether they want to kill me or not.

Graham makes these claims in a recently published essay on income inequality. The internet followed its solemn duty and exploded in a panoply of rage, and snark.

Discussions on economic inequality are not new for long-time readers of Graham’s essays. His most recent writing further explicates his views, but they are not so different from the perspectives expressed in 2004 or 2005.

As is infuriatingly typical with brilliant people, Graham makes a lot of good points and the essay is thought-provoking and challenging. It is not perfect, however.

His statement about YC increasing income inequality rings strange to me because, in order to fund great founders and companies, Y Combinator itself is designed to solve, in part, economic inequality.

Let’s consider a woodcutter. In the essay, Graham uses the concept of a simple woodcutter in order to illustrate how economic inequality can be a function of wealth creation. If woodcutter Jane makes five chairs and woodcutter Steve makes zero, Jane generates wealth for herself and an economic inequality with Steve.

Stop smiling, Steve. You’re a burden on capitalist society!
Image credit: Steve Wilson