No, what they did was pick an SoC called QCM6490 which is used for embedded and industrial applications, and Qualcomm officially supports those for 8 years, unlike the snapdragon SoCs. According to gsmarena it should have performance similar to a snapdragon 778G.
The few cents a creator gets from your youtube premium subscription is way more than they would ever get from you watching ads, so yes, OP is actually right.
Just because they’re not gonna get a massive cut from your sub doesn’t mean it’s not the most beneficial solution for everyone.