The joys of wealth transfer from the poor and the middle class workers to the asset owning class via inflation and the Cantillion Effect [1].
Except for the founders/early employees who get a modest (sometimes excessive) paycheck.
That would be the case if VCs were investing their own money, but they're not. They're investing on behalf of their LPs. Who LPs are is generally an extremely closely-guarded secret, but it includes institutional investors, which means middle-class pensions and 401(k)s are wrapped up in these investments as well, just as they were tied up in the 2008 financial crisis.
It's not as clean-cut as it seems.