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As much as this sentiment feels natural for an engineer there are a few things to keep in mind:

* you get exposed to a wider range of technology at a startup and can work on different things; that's more fun for you personally especially when you're under 30 yo and still learning the ropes; political indoctrination is mostly non-existent

* many startups at best get acquired; so all your "useful" efforts could end up in /dev/null or be completely replaced after the next VC round

* a minority of startups are doing real tech that's worth tolerating small company inconveniences; for every Imply/Rockset/Starburst there are many more companies building another web app, likely using inferior programming languages

* Big Co compensation and benefits are unbelievable for people coming from startups. Work/life balance cannot be compared too. Unlimited PTO could actually be European-style 4 weeks. I believe there were not so many posh places to work at ten years ago and so it was less realistic to join one.

* there's no question that startups and large corporations require dramatically different mindsets/habits. But you really get paid a lot to tolerate that smaller-than-a-tiny-cog feeling.