The World might be better off without everyone having a degree (The Atlantic)

[hashmander]

It's just simple economics. They're going to keep flooding people to college because college is a business. The more students that go to college, the more money they make. On the other hand, the more people with degrees, the less companies will pay because of oversupply of labor. Degrees were the thing to get during our parents generation because very few have them. Now they are as common as can be and are essentially worthless and those jobs that your parents told you to avoid are the ones now paying well like the trades. Turning everything into essentially a trade school is going to eventually make the salaries in those industries to go down as there is an excess of labor, but then again, those trade schools 'MIGHT' be cheaper than 4 year universities, although the prices will go up as more people start attending.
The key? Avoid crowded/hyped industries unless you are extremely talented.

it's not a might be cheaper situation, in most cases they are free because of the desperation to get people in these fields. when they start charging big money for trade school that's when you know it's at peak saturation and you need to pursue something else.

 

[Robbie3000]

With the rise of automation...

Nevermind. I'll let y'all teach your kids that education is irrelevant.

It's like the twilight zone in here. I've noticed anti higher education is more prevalent that I would have expected on the coli. Probably a bunch of lazy dudes who don't have the discipline to complete college shytting on people who were able to persevere and finish school.

I came here as a child as did some of my extended family members and family friends. Most of our parents came here on student visas so higher education was always held in high regards in our households.... as it is in most immigrant communities.

In our circle of family and friends, almost everyone has a college degree or better. School has lifted our small community from barely working class when we arrived in the states to solidly middle or upper middle class. Extrapolate that to a group the size of the African American community and you can see what is possible.

Another example, in my group of friends and associates, I have high school friends who didn't go to college and I have friends that I met in college and grad school. I can definitely tell you without hesitation, the friends that I met in college and grad school are doing much better financially than friends that only have a high school diploma.

You nikkas are hustling backwards talking about you don't need higher education. It's one of the easiest ways to springboard yourself into a comfortable middle class lifestyle if not better. Hopefully along the way, you take advantage the higher learning part of a college education and not only use it to attain job skills.

 

[hashmander]

college isn't the only form of higher education. a journeyman electrician has furthered his or her education.

 

[Robbie3000]

college isn't the only form of higher education. a journeyman electrician has furthered his or her education.

It's a noble profession, but an electrician is not what I want my kids to aspire towards. I want my kids to aspire to attend ivy league schools. I want them settling for big state schools if ivy league is not possible.

 

[TTT]

In a service economy like the US there will be a lot more focus on college education. Countries like Germany and Taiwan have systems that also provide alternate careers through trades because in the case of Germany they have a huge Mittlestand firms( midsize often family owned manufacturing firms making industrial equipment). The problem has always been you cannot tell parents that their child is not cut out for college but should follow a path in education that does not lead to college. I have seen the same college focused education system in many African countries and with limited college spaces unlike the US it leaves many people behind.

 

[Μαρία]

While trade schools can be (somewhat) less expensive than four-year universities and usually faster to complete, they still cost money. To attend trade school, you have to pay tuition and most people often have to take out loans. College isn't just Liberal Arts degrees, it's Engineering, Medicine, Teachers. The person that wrote this article has a PhD and a cushy job and now he has the gall to tell everyone else not to get theirs. How about an article on making tuition more affordable so that more people can afford to pay out of pocket and live at the same time.