Does the start equal the end?
Python 3, 23 bytes



s=input()
s[0]!=s[-1]&lt;e


Output is via exit code, so 0 (success) is truthy and 1 (failure) is falsy. If this is acceptable, a byte can be saved.

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How it works

First of all, if s is an empty string, s[0] will raise an IndexError, causing the program to fail.

For non-empty s, if the first and last characters are equal, s[0]!=s[-1] will evaluate to False, so the program exits cleanly and immediately.

Finally, if the characters are different, s[0]!=s[-1] will evaluate to True, causing the compairson s[-1]&lt;e to be performed. Since e is undefined, that raises a NameError.

If backwards compatibility with Python 2 is not desired,

s[0]!=s[-1]&lt;3


works as well, since comparing a string with an integer raises a TypeError.