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Re:Dropbox Files Confidentially for U.S. IPO by econner on Thursday January 11, 2018 @12:20PM (#16125655)
This exactly. There's very a small chance you end up at a company like Dropbox, and even if you do it could still take 10 years to see any profit from it. Add to that the significant financial risk you probably have to take on to exercise options and pay AMT, all the while completely uncertain of payoff.
Re:Dropbox Files Confidentially for U.S. IPO by jforman on Thursday January 11, 2018 @12:29PM (#16125742)
These days, that is mitigated partially by salaries that are closer to market (and sometimes even higher than market) than was historically the case for startups.

But the AMT/exercising problem can be severe if you're unlucky.