Brewster Rockit by Tim Rickard for May 29, 2023

Well,… it depends on where you go to college, what your major is, and what kind of job you get afterwards.

There are loads of students who didn’t go to college and instead signed up for “trade” schools, took out loans, and then couldn’t find a job and are now deep in debt. There are even too many legitimate colleges. Many will accept almost anyone who applies and can pay tuition.

The hope is that eventually the loan payments end and the better pay does not.

Such an American problem.

My son is just a couple of years out of college and makes more than I did at retirement. He’ll have his loans paid off in ten years (as did I). College isn’t for everyone, and that’s fine. HOWEVER, the United States continues to make it increasingly difficult for the non-rich to go to college, and that is a grievous mistake. We NEED college educated people every bit as much as plumbers, electricians, barbers, or anything else. We are the only wealthy country that has made it harder for its people to get a good education.

Want do colleges do with all the money they get today?

Also, student loans discourage those pesky poor people from trying to get non-menial jobs. Know your place, poor people!

Back in the early 1960s there was a series of public service spots urging people to “give to the college of your choice” with the tag line “college is America’s best friend”.

When did it become fashionable to disparage colleges and universities? It must have been before government support for higher education was cut off, causing tuition and fees to skyrocket.

No, car mechanics and ditch diggers make way more money.

We need a nationwide student union that could collectively bargain with colleges and universities. American students are, in effect, being blackmailed- “Give us a pile of dough or no education for you”. The rules of economics apply here as well as anywhere- if no one agreed to pay $100,000 for a car, there would be no $100,000 cars. Same for college- if students could collectively tell the education industry to shove it, tuition fees would quickly collapse back to reasonable levels. As with most aspects of our financial lives in America, we need to reevaluate our worship of a system that enables, encourages and supports rapacious and unbridled capitalism at the expense of, well, almost everybody.

College is not about making money. It’s about learning how to learn, finding out things that interest you, and developing relationships with motivated people. I got two separate science degrees, wound up working as an electronics systems engineer and later as a software developer. If you pay attention in college, you can adapt to the curve balls that life throws at you.

Since I can’t post the image directly…

https://img.ifunny.co/images/70f5852d40c43a1efe740fc4526ba1ccba05e7dbe33ac97b30b6dd5b7a755578_1.jpg

If done properly they will make far more money than they would have borrowed to get this education. Further, it will give them the power to create a better world.

Unless you inherited a small fortune from your grandmother to pay for a four year degree, go to a “junior college” and get an AA degree as I did. Or learn a trade as others have said.

Not necessarily, there are plenty of college graduates flipping burgers. It depends on what you learn and how you apply it. On the other hand, if you don’t have a college degree on your resume, you have two strikes against when applying for a job.

College grads get jobs where they can sit down.

Too many people don’t bother to research potential occupations. They don’t talk to people already in those occupations to find out how it is in that world. They don’t investigate job markets and pay scales, recurring costs (such as maintaining a license or replacing personal protective gear), or compare benefits and perks. They don’t analyze the costs to enter an occupation (such as a college degree if required). They just listen to popular gossip and assume that what they hear will apply to themselves.

It’s not really a kid’s fault – all of this requires help from supposedly experienced and reasonable adults. Sadly, our schools and many parents fail to meet the challenge. In my opinion (for what it’s worth) I believe that most kids would be better off getting jobs straight out of high school – where they can experience what their education levels and skills can (or can’t) earn them. I’ve seen this act as the motivation that young adults need to take career training more seriously… but it can also trap some into a permanent low level rut.

Trade school looking real good right about now

Yes, you’re missing fulfillment, professional opportunities, and a lot of other non-monetary outcomes from the experience.

Things like this are why so many young men are going to trade school. It’s a shorter training period, the tuition is much cheaper, and most trades have readily-available jobs so people can more quickly get into their careers & pay off whatever debt they did get to pay that tuition.

Not really. They pay back a lot more than was loaned to them so the loan companies make a huge profit. What? No it is not about helping the students get an education. Why would we do that? BTW, we do credit cards as well. You look like you could use a sixth one to pay off the other five.

I graduated in 1979 with Zero Debt.

I was able to pay most of my tuition and rent with my earnings from part time jobs and two 6 month stints at a full time “Co-op” job that the University arranged and gave me course credit for since the job was working in my Major.

For some strange reason, such jobs have all become “Unpaid Internships” that you have to be Rich to afford to take.

I even had a bit of money left over in my bank account after graduation.

It’s amazing how much things changed after Ronnie Raygun and the RepubliQans ""Improved" our education system over the last 40 years.