The rational can't be entirely wrong. In tech, skills and ideas gained during employment help generate new ideas. Since you are paid and trained, there is this

The rational can't be entirely wrong. In tech, skills and ideas gained during employment help generate new ideas. Since you are paid and trained, there is this incentive to profit from everything you produce. Companies use tricks such as 'coded on the corporate hardware', 'non compete agreement' etc. Grow some common sense, do all your side project strictly outside office hours, on your own hardware, in domains that don't even remotely relate to what your employer's industries , and it will be very hard for the emplying organisation to come after you. I could inspect everything my organisation does, how they do it, then bake something up that technically outperforms it, then quit and work on marketing, again Leveraging everything I've learned, their mistakes and success. Would that be fair? On the contrary, working for an optic company and developing oil drilling optimisation methods to sell once in quit, would they even come after me? It's fair, won't trigger any suspicion or even interest in pursuing litigation.