Ycombinator has made a lot of money based on the idea that some people are better at creating start ups than others. They don't just bet on ideas they also bet on people.
On the flipside, it could be that Y Combinator has made a lot of money by creating an environment that helps startups succeed. Apart from money, they provide founders advice, structure and a set of motivated peers. More cynically, they also provide prestige, validation and connections.
I have no doubt Y Combinator would still be successful even if their selection method was not very good. (I tend to think about top universities the same way—the quality of Harvard's admissions process is not the core reason they graduate so many successful students.)
Personally, I feel like the success of Harvard students is mostly selection bias with respect to their admissions department - i.e., everyone who gets into Harvard would be successful anywhere else.
But then again, I was just rejected from Harvard, so you might want to take my opinion with a grain of salt.
I also thought that, but I couldn’t find any references to any of those studies when I was writing my comment. Do you happen to know where I could find them?
Right. And that source isn't claiming that people are all equally good at founding startups. Rather, it's claiming that previous failures don't substantially make a person better at founding successful companies. (They do find a very small 2% effect, but that may be statistical noise).
