It’s certainly not easy to start a company posied for world dominance when a lot of local laws and culture prevent you from working your employees to the bone.

The average workweek in the Netherlands is 28 hours a week. You may shift this if you are a startup, but culture is certainly something that affects your propensity to generate unicorns.

It's not about starting company - in the literal sense as you write, because this is just an entry at some register somewhere.

Depending on the EU country, the experience may be nerve wrecking and some institutions treat you as a criminal for dearing to start your own business (typically in Eastern Europe). There is a lot of crabs in the bucket mentality from the communist times.

Then you have extremely complex legislation that is full of traps. Oh you forgot to send that form declaring something you thought irrelevant and nobody told you about? Here is the fine for you.

I know a couple of people who ended up with life changing financial troubles because their accountant messed something up, and not because their business was going bad.

Then you get the cliques and corruption in the cities. Your business is doing very well and you forgot to buy a dinner to a local politician? Too bad you would have learned his nephew has exactly the same business idea as yours. Month later your business is swarmed by all sorts of inspections from various government bodies. You can't do business and your customers think something is up with you and they no longer come. You end up having mental health problems and closing the business with debt.

Six months later your former clients call you to say that politicians nephew runs exactly the same business as you had in the office building you had rented. Politician's nephew offers you a job and you take it, because you are in debt.

This is how things work in Europe.