A few of Huge Tech’s biggest success tales are from faculty dropouts. Mark Zuckerberg launched Fb in 2004 from his Harvard College dorm room (and later dropped out). Invoice Gates additionally left Harvard and cofounded Microsoft with Paul Allen in 1975.
However Jeff Bezos, founding father of the world’s largest on-line retailer Amazon, stated Zuckerberg and Gates are the “exception” to the concept that all main tech firms had been based by faculty dropouts and {that a} diploma doesn’t matter as a lot today.
Whereas it’s “attainable” to be 18, 19, or 20 years outdated and drop out of school to change into a terrific entrepreneur, Bezos stated these tech leaders are an exception.
“I at all times advise to younger folks: Go work at a best-practices firm someplace the place you may study plenty of primary basic issues [like] methods to rent rather well, methods to interview, and so forth.,” Bezos stated throughout an interview at Italian Tech Week final fall. “There’s plenty of stuff you’ll study in a terrific firm that can enable you, after which there’s nonetheless a lot of time to begin an organization after you’ve got absorbed it.”
Working at an organization, as a substitute of instantly attempting to begin one, “will increase your odds” of being profitable, he added.
Bezos, now the third-richest individual on the earth at a $268 billion internet price, based Amazon when he was 30 years outdated after a few decade of labor expertise. Each Gates and Zuckerberg, then again, had been simply 19 years outdated after they launched Microsoft and Fb, respectively. Nonetheless, Zuckerberg is the sixth-wealthiest individual on the earth with a $231 billion internet price, and Gates is the Sixteenth-richest at a $118 billion internet price.
However Bezos says that “further 10 years of expertise truly improved the percentages that Amazon would succeed.” And succeed it did: At the moment, the web retailer has a whopping $2.64 trillion market cap.
Not solely did Bezos have work expertise, however he additionally completed faculty. He graduated summa cum laude—the very best honors—from Princeton College in 1986 with a bachelor’s diploma in engineering.
He was additionally elected to honor societies Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi, and likewise served as president of the Princeton chapter of the College students for the Exploration and Growth of House. That educational focus later got here to fruition in 2000 with Bezos’s aerospace-tech firm Blue Origin, which he’s described because the “most vital work” he does. Blue Origin is a non-public firm, so its valuation has by no means been disclosed, however Bezos has stated he thinks it is going to finally be larger than Amazon.
“That might at all times be my recommendation: I completed faculty, and I loved faculty,” Bezos stated. “I believe it’s been useful to me.”
Nonetheless, youthful generations proceed to query the worth of a faculty diploma. As the price of faculty continues to develop and out there jobs for newer grads shrink, many are beginning to query the true return on funding for a level. Even Jim Farley, the CEO of Ford, stated throughout a current firm convention final week, going to school “must be a debate.”
“Nothing within the historical past of Western civilization has gotten dearer, extra shortly,” added Mike Rowe, a longtime vocational advocate. “Not power, not meals, not actual property, not even well being care, [nothing has been inflated more] than the price of a four-year diploma.”
A model of this story was printed on Fortune.com on October 6, 2025.
