[hkarthik]

My theory is that college has become too expensive to afford to drop out and start a company with a massive student loan bill that you may never pay off, and will cripple you with debt for a couple of decades.

Given that reality, it makes way more sense for someone to finish their degree, land a FAANG job, work a few years to pay off their debt/save, and then take a swing at a startup if they still have the itch.

This has changed the financing substantially, because an ex FAANG engineer is only going to do a startup if they can get back to a similar pay/lifestyle within a few years. This means the VCs have to write much bigger funding checks, and the companies need to have bigger ideas and reach unicorn status much more quickly.