Most of us are raised to believe that college is the golden ticket to success. You graduate and are supposedly guaranteed a prosperous career.
To succeed in societies eyes, one must have a college degree to become a contributing member of society.
But with the ever-rising tuition fees and the dwindling employment rates for new graduates, it makes me wonder if getting a college education is all it’s cracked up to be.
It’s a big decision and a big investment as well.
There are expenses linked to college such as housing, commuting and textbooks.
By far the most problematic expense would be loan debt.
According to libertystreeteconomics.org, the outstanding student loan balance now stands at about $870 billion, surpassing the total credit card balance ($693 billion) and the total auto loan balance ($730 billion).
College is a big business, and like any business, it is involved in the trade of goods and services to consumers.
The service being your education and the goods, unfortunately, are the students. And without students, the college would cease to exist.
Colleges and universities insist that you take a lot of prerequisite classes beyond your major.
This involves you taking even more time to get your degree. Time equals money and you will be spending a lot of both on classes that have bearing on your major.
There is no need to take a fencing class unless you are planning on getting an eye patch and sailing the seas for lost treasure but hey, you paid for it.
A college experience is a costly one, and a good parent would do anything for their kids including paying lots of money for them to go to college.
Another (discouraging) fact is that a student may study in a field for 4 years and not be able to find a job in that particular field.
A person might graduate college and end up having to work at Subway. So much for that B.A. in Philosophy.
There are about 115,000 janitors with Bachelors Degrees in the US.
There’s nothing wrong with being a janitor, but did you have to spend all that money to become one?
What about experience? In my opinion, that speaks more than a piece of paper.
A college student may have book smarts but lack real world work experience.
A person may not have a 4-year degree but they do know how to work hard and have initiative.
Is a person less qualified because they have never attended college?
As an employer, would you rather have someone who studied the field or have been in the field?
There are less expensive ways to get a higher education. There are trade schools and community colleges. In fact, people with two-year degrees are earning more than people with four-year degrees.
Find your talent and honor it with experience.
Don’t let your parents and societies expectations define your financial worth.