[dasil003]

Your back of the envelope is dubious. Where are they paying 22-year-olds $80k? Only at soul-sucking corporations and over-funded startups with no fiscal responsibility.

Also, the person with the capability to get a CS/Math/Science degree (from a respectable program) will likely have other potential that fall somewhere between the typical dropout and Gatesian success.

I think the strongest argument to stay in school is that most 18-year-olds don't have the discipline to fulfill that potential, so they'll get more out of a structured environment. I know I was certainly this way. However if you are the exceptional 18-year-old that is driven in some way (whether it be code, art, music, business, whatever), then you probably won't regret jumping.

[lurker17]

Many people at Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Facebook, and others have retained their souls along with their $80+K new-grad salaries.

[Goladus]

Yeah, you might be able to get a high-paying recent-grad job but odds are you won't, either because you don't make the cut technically (the bar is high) or because your job-finding, interviewing, and negotiating skills are crap.

Often, it's both-- because you don't make it through a college-assisted placement program into a high-profile company that likes to hire recent grads, and the college hasn't provided any reasonable training on how to go about getting a good job and compensation on your own, you flounder and struggle up a ladder of mediocre tech jobs until you figure that stuff out. You are probably not making $80k/yr during that time.

[dasil003]

In other words, the pick of the litter can get that much.