I really wish I was born with the raw intellect to do cool stuff like this.
I'm pretty skeptical of this idea. Money yields freedom and experiences (that I currently don't have).
I'm also going to take a wild guess and say you're working on a graduate stipend or aren't in the US.
Anyways, good luck on your dreams :)
There are a number of studies on the matter: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=money+and+happiness+study . Money makes you happier, but only to a point and with quickly diminishing returns. Once you're basic needs are met, you need to work on other areas of your life, like social relationships, to find happiness, not just making more money.
Also look up "Hedonic Treadmill"; human psychology is such that we get used to what makes us happy faster than we expect. You think 150k will make you happy? Once you make that it does make you happy! But then a few months later, it's like "eh whatever".
As an aside, this is always an interesting thought experiment.
I read an example in John Carreyrou's Bad Blood (Theranos expose) recently:
"Several members of the Frat Pack joined Greg and two of his colleagues from the engineering department for lunch on the big terrace overlooking the parking lot one day. A discussion about the low IQs of some of the world’s top soccer players led them to debate the question, Would you rather be smart and poor or dumb and rich? The three engineers all chose smart and poor, while the Frat Pack voted unanimously for dumb and rich. Greg was struck by how clearly the line was drawn between the two groups. They were all in their mid-to late twenties with good educations, but they valued different things."