If you don't come from a stable household your teenage years are going to be absolutely horrible. You're going to know enough to understand that the adults around you should do things like pay bills, but they just don't want to. They'd rather buy new cars and get them repoed.
I make an absurd amount of money now, and I'm grateful every time I pay my rent. Honest to God, if I could change one thing about the educational system I get rid of the idea that your parents are responsible to pay for your college.
If you're coming from a bad household this simply isn't going to work, but you'd be the most likely to benefit from a scholarship or financial aid. What ends up happening is this gets locked behind your parents doing basic things like filling out forms, but they're just incapable of doing it.
I can't put in words how devastating dropping out of college due to this stupid system was. Through the magic of programming I was able to still establish a great career, but when you come from a broken home you're just going to take hit after hit after hit.
I often need to distance myself from what I guess normal people struggle with. I'll see something stupid on Reddit like a man in his late 20s complaining that his parents want him to get a job, and I have to stop myself from screaming at my computer.
And, for a lot of people, it's just not true. Maybe I'm really fortunate, but I can't remember a better time in my past life. I think for a lot of people, things generally get better as you age. You definitely get more autonomy, compared to when you were a child and teenager. Financially, you get established in your career, you save a little money, maybe you can even afford a home. Socially, you have better, closer friends as you get older. You can worry less and less about what other people think of you as you get older. I guess this is a little privilege showing, but generally I think my mental wellbeing is much better now than when I was a child or teenager.
High School was the absolute worst point in my life, and that's true for a lot of people I know. You lack autonomy, you're bored, you have no money, you're in a prison-like institution getting bullied for most of your weekday. You're under a lot of pressure and have to worry about grades and behaving the way adults want you to behave. It sucked! Who are these insane people where high school was the best time of their life?