When I did YC in S16 I found it worth it, but IMO the biggest value of YC at the time was being able to work on building and selling product for 3 straight months without talking to investors, and knowing that funding was likely not going to be a problem at demo day week assuming you did exactly that. YC had already "vetted" your company for investors so that you didn't need to prove yourself in any other way than hard work/growth. After demo day, you could fundraise in a week or two and then get right back to work.

By not talking to investors, you could grow well more than 7%, so it was worth giving up 7%.

Of course, YC has a LOT of other value but that was quite possibly the biggest one.

Unfortunately with the number of companies in recent batches I feel like that value is no longer captured, not all companies are chased after by investors at Demo Day, and the other value YC used to provide, i.e. individual attention given to companies, is also much less than it used to be.

IMO it's still a great program but 7% is too much for what is offered today.