What I've found out is that it's never really about dropping out and the fascination with college dropouts is nonsensical. I never went to college expecting to drop out; the timing just made it happen. Furthermore, my lack of a degree doesn't make me a better or more successful entrepreneur.
Dropping out isn’t an accomplishment, any more than money is a sign of achievement. Sometimes, but not always, it’s simply a symptom of success.
I think if you were to look at all college dropouts (not just those that leave to go to SF) you would see it's certainly not a symptom of success. There are definitely successful people without degrees but it is the exception rather than the rule.
It also depends on your definition of successful. By most definitions (including mine) this guy isn't. YC may change that, but it may not. I don't think it will have much to do with his degree, or lack thereof.
What I've found out is that it's never really about dropping out and the fascination with college dropouts is nonsensical. I never went to college expecting to drop out; the timing just made it happen.
It seems like the real question isn't dropping out or not; the real question is whether an opportunity arises that makes dropping out and pursuing that opportunity make more sense than continue in school. History clearly shows us that, in some cases, dropping out and pursuing opportunity is the better move (Gates, Zuckerberg, etc. being the famous examples).
If you're dropping out because you think you have vague plans about how you'd like to start a startup, that's probably dumb, but if you're dropping out because you've started startup X, which is going to do Y, and the time is now, then that might be a pretty good idea.
Monetary success is an exception to begin with. Only 5% of the North American population earn more than $90,000 per year. Leaving me curious about your exception statement. Of the people in that top 5%, or even 1% if your data better supports it, what does the education distribution look like?
Please take this with a grain of salt - I could only find it on Alternet[1] and I looked for the Gallup source they're referencing but shouldn't find it. The article is from December of 2011 as well.
In the top 1% of US households (those with an income above ~$550,000 a year according to this article, but I've seen lower-end figures ranging from $380-660k/yr), 72% have a college degree v. 31% of the lower 99%. "Nearly half" of the top 1% has some form of post-graduate education v. less than 1 in 5 of the 99%.
A lot of the 1% are CEOs, licensed professionals (JDs, MDs) and Wall Street executives, all positions the require baccalaureate or postgraduate degrees in almost every case.
By the numbers, it seems that having completed a high school diploma or less puts you in better standing than having completed just a degree (27% vs 23%), though a post-graduate degree is the clear winner.
So, it seems that if you are not willing to go through post-graduate studies (which, I assume, is primarily limited to the professional degrees you mentioned – MD, JD, etc.), you are slightly better off dropping out or not going to college at all in terms of achieving success as defined by the top 1%. That is actually pretty interesting data with regards to the subject of this thread.
What I've found out is that it's never really about dropping out and the fascination with college dropouts is nonsensical. I never went to college expecting to drop out; the timing just made it happen. Furthermore, my lack of a degree doesn't make me a better or more successful entrepreneur.
Dropping out isn’t an accomplishment, any more than money is a sign of achievement. Sometimes, but not always, it’s simply a symptom of success.