I did a coding bootcamp in Austin TX at the age of 18, instead of going to college, and got a job right after at a startup making $40k USD/year, which became $50k USD/year in a few months after getting a raise, and then after working there for a year I switched jobs to a top tech company many of you know, and by 21 I was making $75k USD/year

I got a lot of socializing at both companies, got to hang out with guys my own age and guys older than me, got to have some fun (maybe not as much as my peers in university), got to grow up, etc.

I think university back in the day used to mean a lot more, and I would have enjoyed it, but now it's so watered down cause everyone goes, and political / cultural movements have made the university programs require much more effort and much less thought

Just my 2 cents

Edit: also, to add to this, at the same time I also learned a lot of stuff completely outside of the domain of software through books on my own. philosophy books, history books, sociology books, etc. etc. I really liked that I was able to carefully select the authors and books and topics to the ones that grabbed my eye.

edit 2: oh ya! i also got a lot of fun socializing at the bootcamp too.