You're treating employees as though they had the same tenure requirements as founders did. They just don't. If an employee starts a job at market salary, 18 months later the company dies, so they start another one at market salary, then the same thing happens, so they start another one, and yet again the same exact thing happens, so they start a fourth job, and that's the one they can stay at for several years..... then they've received substantially the same number of paychecks as if they had stayed at the first company for 6 years. It just doesn't matter that they had to change jobs a few times.
If a Founder is working for equity in a company for 18 months and it dies, it's an absolute personal disaster. There's no way to repeat that four times in a row and remain solvent and sane.
This simple example shows the fact that really it doesn't matter whether a company really guarantees an employee a paycheck or not. If it has enough money to pay you for a few months, you're good to start.
If a Founder is working for equity in a company for 18 months and it dies, it's an absolute personal disaster. There's no way to repeat that four times in a row and remain solvent and sane.
This simple example shows the fact that really it doesn't matter whether a company really guarantees an employee a paycheck or not. If it has enough money to pay you for a few months, you're good to start.