I however do feel that the best way to learn that you're wasting time with overly-complex solutions is to suffer the consequences for it, and the earlier you suffer them the better. So, I would say that wasting time (as long as it doesn't take long for you to realize you're the one who f'ed it up) when you're young has a high benefit, too. You learned it the hard way.

I don't think the poster was just talking about money, although there may also be a time-value factor for other things (health, neural plasticity, etc).