You have to be an L5 engineer at Google. And I know a guy earning $700k per year at 32-33 in ARM. Plus other VPs. Depends on your vantage point, but starting a startup is way harder. Personal experience here.
The author of this post is non-technical, and from Austria, this path was not an option. Or speaking from my experience, as a software developer in Canada, starting salaries out of school at your average Canadian tech company are ~$60-70K CAD, and as a senior developer you’re looking at ~$100-150K CAD. Even getting to $200K (CAD, not USD) by 37 would be rare for a Canadian software developer.
Your comment was “Honestly corporate salaries will earn you 3-4 million by the time you are 37 or so”, as if that’s easy/normal. It isn’t, it’s exceptional and rare.
For a tiny fraction of the world, earning $3-4 mil by 37 in the corporate world is a possibility, but for the vast, VAST majority, like well over 99% of the world, it isn’t, at all. Globally, the annual salary to be in the top 1% of earners is ~$32K USD. In America, it’s ~$420K USD, but that’s made up largely of C-suite executives and business owners who are well above 37 years old.
Most startup founders are deciding between “work in the corporate world until I’m 60-65, or try founding a startup.” Based on that, some still give startup founding a shot, even though they know it’s going to be super hard and will likely fail.