I'll take smart people playing chess any day over those people choosing to go into the tech industry where they spend all their time building addictive products that drive ad impressions.

I'd love it if they put their talents to work by going into medical research, chemistry / materials science, or even political science and try to take meaningful steps towards making the world a better place. That route seems to be a lot less popular these days and obviously compensation has a lot to do with it.