I Live in NYC and im a sophomore in high school.
Basically, my real goal in life is to become a successful entrepreneur or a businessman/salesman. My grades in school arent the best and to be honest i know that getting a high school diploma is the bare minimum that i need. I had a decent part time job that paid $11 an hour now it is $13 an hour because of ny minimum wage however i had to recently quit it to give a little bit more effort in school. My idea is that i would switch out traditional high school for online highschool. My reasoning would be that the courses would be easier and i could finish my highschool diploma faster. Also if i were to do it, i could work 5 hours a day at my part time and make over 30-40k in the next two year of "highschool". Makes sense or no, i do not need the money, but it would certianlty help if i were to open a business. Also both traditional and online can still lead me to a college in worst case scenario.
Education is very necessary, but survive too, it all depends on what you want to study, if you want to be an entrepreneur it is best to read some Warren Buffet books, is a great investor and has an impressive vision of business, if you want to speculate in the market, read books Wyckoff and Jesse Livermore, are great in their advice and you learn a lot.