There is a second kind of leverage that startups in particular can get out of their developers: expecting them to live for the job.
The choice between a company where (a) you work on assigned tickets, but standard business hours and weekends off and X days of guaranteed holiday per year versus (b) a high autonomy, high pay but if the company needs you to pull a 90-hour week then you do it without asking - it's a tradeoff. Whether you get to write your own JIRA tickets is just one of many dimensions here.
One of those two options is not compatible, for example, with having responsibilities outside of work such as childcare.
The choice between a company where (a) you work on assigned tickets, but standard business hours and weekends off and X days of guaranteed holiday per year versus (b) a high autonomy, high pay but if the company needs you to pull a 90-hour week then you do it without asking - it's a tradeoff. Whether you get to write your own JIRA tickets is just one of many dimensions here.
One of those two options is not compatible, for example, with having responsibilities outside of work such as childcare.