You would be right if the choice set was drop out and never come back but have a 2% chance of becoming very wealthy or stay in school and have a higher chance of being middle class but much lower chance of becoming very wealthy.
The actual choice set is drop out and spend several years trying to become very wealthy and then go back to school and be delayed by those several years on the path well traveled, or just take the path well traveled right away.
It seems extremely unlikely to me that it would be possible for this to be a net negative on average at any point in time past the first few years. average[0.02(mega wealthy)+ N(success but not mega wealthy) + (1-N-0.02(regular path delayed 5 years)] should always be larger than average(regular path) and it should get more pronounced over time and the spread between regular path and regular path delayed 5 years will likely diminish over time.
On the society level, unless you are so cynical that you think all the benefit that causes the value of those companies to be in the billions is coming from some sort of market power abuse and none of it is coming from creating something that is so much better than what was there before that people are buying it in a big way, it would be a massive benefit as well because you just increased the conversion rate of ideas into product that benefits society by a massive multiple.
The actual choice set is drop out and spend several years trying to become very wealthy and then go back to school and be delayed by those several years on the path well traveled, or just take the path well traveled right away.
It seems extremely unlikely to me that it would be possible for this to be a net negative on average at any point in time past the first few years. average[0.02(mega wealthy)+ N(success but not mega wealthy) + (1-N-0.02(regular path delayed 5 years)] should always be larger than average(regular path) and it should get more pronounced over time and the spread between regular path and regular path delayed 5 years will likely diminish over time.
On the society level, unless you are so cynical that you think all the benefit that causes the value of those companies to be in the billions is coming from some sort of market power abuse and none of it is coming from creating something that is so much better than what was there before that people are buying it in a big way, it would be a massive benefit as well because you just increased the conversion rate of ideas into product that benefits society by a massive multiple.