If you're only looking at cash in the bank afterwards from the exit maybe. What doing a startup does is worst case, that it accelerates your carreer a lot. If

If you're only looking at cash in the bank afterwards from the exit maybe. What doing a startup does is worst case, that it accelerates your carreer a lot. If you do startups for 2 years, you can get the jobs (if you want) that people working at a corporation will get within 10 years, so it accelerates your career by the factor of around 5. Examples? Myself and all my startup-friends who have to work for someone every now and then when the bank balance nears 0 again are offered very high-paying/high responsibility jobs. The reason for that is that the education about business, building a product and personal growth that you get out of a startup is simply unmatched. For that reason, it's smarter to do a startup in all cases. However, only if you want to accelerate your career of course. If you don't want to make career in your life, then doing a startup is not smarter, because it does take a toll.