How valuable is a college education?

They'll get better huh? When? When employers start giving a s*** about the long term consequences of their MORE, MORE, MORE profit mentality? When corporations and CEO's decide they've extracted enough? When employers summarily decide that they want to make less? It ain't going to happen any time soon bud, but, you keep waitin' and preachin' the corporate strategy.

 

I don't think we should manipulate the career choices of our young citizenry through legislation. It is up both the public sector and private sector to provide as many options for career paths based upon economic wants and needs, and non-economic wants. It is up to individuals to make choices based upon economic wants and needs, and non-economic wants.

 

Im not a fan of a liberal arts degree either, however, a bachelors degree is still a ticket to play the game and opens doors for interviews not open to those without degrees.

Picked an industry and stuck with it?....I presume you mean someone that goes from high school, into a company, then works their way up the ladder? This happens in rare instances, but even when it does, that person is stuck at that company for life, for better or worse. Someone that has stepped into a degreed field by working their way up, has no ability to switch companies because that new company is going to require a degree for the position they worked their way up to.

 

If you are so anti coporation...perhaps you should consider being an entrepeneur and taking your own risks? Of course if you go that route, a college education would help you avoid many of the pitfalls.

 

LOL. I remember. Used to say they were getting a bachelor of MRS. A lot has changed since then, I will say that.

 

Maybe major in one of the following:

Management
Finance
Economics
Entreprenuership
Financial Management
International Business

 

Nah...I just need to learn how to BS the ignorant and and convince them to work for pennies. Learning how to cut somebody elses throat is a much more valuable "business" and marketable corporate skill. I couldn't find that class at my local college though. :/

 

One example. I have a friend who can literally barely read or write. However, he went into steel, and has worked his way up to 20 bucks an hour, which in southeast Idaho is a good wage. All in the matter of a few years, he has his own house with a basement apartment he rents out for more than half his mortgage. Now, take into account, through working his way up the chain, he knows everything to do with steel, every piece of equipment to the complex math involved, and the majority of his industry, all the way up to the foremen, are baby boomers getting ready to retire. He is set to make large amounts of money, without having to pay a dime for school loans. I'm not saying either is a specific road to success, I'm just saying different strokes for different folks, and telling everyone to get a degree because it is a "right of passage" is to set many up for the fall. I have friends with engineering degrees who came out of college making more money than him, but in the long run he has a far better chance at economic mobility and will eventually double their salary.

 

So you dont want to work for a corporation because they are greedy.... you dont want to work for yourself because youd have to then BE greedy.....you dont see a need for continuing education....what exactly is your projected path to success? I would think that coming from your mindset would be VERY depressing.

 

http://www.bls.gov/emp/ep_chart_001.htm

Education is no guarantee of success and lack of one no guarantee of failure.

But it can't hurt to have the odds in your favor, the way I see it.

 

Yes and Bill Gates....yada yada yada. It happens...but we are talking about maximizing ones odds. First off.....20 bucks an hour comes out to what 800 per week....1400 per week if he works 60 hrs per week with overtime. Even the higher figure comes out to 72800. Not a bad sum...nor is it anything amazing...and he is working his butt off 60 hrs per week to earn that much. Now what happens to him if the steel industry leaves idaho? Where does he go? What does he do? He probably starts back at the bottom working in the service industry because good paying manufacturing jobs in this day and age are like winning the lottery.

 

Not ALL manufacturing can leave. There is always the base number of places that survive the cut to get the local contracts. Basically, the purge already hit. At one time there was probably 20-30 fab shops like his. He is in the last 4 or 5, and as long as there is any local commerce they will have work. But I see what you are saying, for sure.

 

Is there no other chart? LOL. Let's pretend higher education isn't a business, and that those stats are solid. It doesn't take into account most people are predicting a double dip. Nor does it take into account what the climate will be in 5 years. I can understand what you all are saying. I'm just recommending to anyone reading, if you have to go into debt for school, you better pick a specialized field in high demand where you have maximum bargaining power as an employee. Also, study globalism before you go. Understand it, as those in power in America are globalists. Know that America returning to glory is no where in their game plan. Absurd professions that use to make decent wages will die with the high standard of living and the high levels of middle class. Hair dressers, culinary arts, massage therapists, chiropractors, etc. are all token fields of a rich people. They will be the first to disappear.

 

Sure, education gives a person an edge to some degree. I submit that corporate America though, isn't primarily interested in educated employees. They're mainly interested in "cheap" employees. Go to your local hospital, for example, and check out the spinning cast of rotating shifts, and then evaluate their intelligence. You think a constant stream on of never ending, over burdened staffing is AN ACCIDENT? They want the cheapest, greenest, labor they can find. That's no accident. Seniority, intelligence, low turnover....all cost too much money for the corporate greedsters. It's true in any profession but most evident in areas like this. First priority..cheap. Next....cheap. That's about it. Either you do it cheap, or I'll get someone else who will. That's the mentality that has destroyed this country, and any hope of a future for anyone of the next generation. Slice, trim, squeeze, take, extract. That's the corporate vocabulary of today.
Now if you want that part time, 8 buck an hour job, you'd better have some initials behind your name on that resume. Or not. Long as you work for 8 bucks an hour.

 

Dude you are so right. The first thing a corporation does is cut a work force in half. And make the remainders do all the extra work. The Corp. squeezes every last drop out of each slave they have left. While they take extended vacation, etc.

 

I don't disagree, but even corporate America needs people who can write well, calculate, and think. Those with those skills will command better pay than those without them.

 

For that exist the elite. A few people would have access to that. While the rest of employees just would be machines to work, anymore else.

And normally, most of the times a person that has received college education is much more educated and has more knowledge than someone that has not. THat is a fact.

And a prosperous society is when the society is more educated.

 

College does a lot more than just open doors for better jobs...

 

Actually I will disagree with your comments above in Bold.

First, we are in a global economy and US business has facilities located all over the world. Many of those with US-only facilities are outsourcing from outside of the USA. This simply means less job growth in the USA.

Meanwhile, population growth and immigrant workers continue. Population growth is forecasted at 2,250,000 per year and this alone requires one-million plus new jobs per year. The USA allows just under one million legal immigrants into the country each year most of which are here to work.

So, you need to create 2 million jobs each year for the above paragraph, and you need to create jobs for the 23 million Americans who are unemployed or under-employed. This employment demand, with very little job supply, might be a continuing problem for many years to come...even decades!

In summary, IMO, we have the global economy, population growth, and a (*)(*)(*)(*)-load out of work today, and, not a very bright work force, so all of this combines to create some form of critical mass in which there might not be acceptable solutions in the future for kids finding suitable employment or the unemployed ever being employed again...

 

And what is wrong with college graduates relocating to Europe, or Asia, or India, or anywhere on Earth, if these areas have jobs available? Where is it written that the private enterprise system in the USA must create jobs for all who want them??

No one is paying attention!! We are, and have been for some time, in a global economy. This means we must also think globally. This means many things we desire might be located somewhere in that global economy outside of the USA. Our problem in the USA is we dig in and expect everything to fall at our feet...

 

You suffer what so many others suffer which is a lack of knowledge and common sense.

A corporation, or a sole-proprietorship, can do anything they wish as long as they have a license, pay taxes, and follow regulations. They can locate in your town, outside of your town, anywhere in the state, anywhere in the USA, and anywhere in the world. Neither of them owe you anything! They are where they are to do business, and since they are private, they can conduct business in any way they wish. Again, they don't owe you a job, they don't owe you security, and they can fire you anytime they wish, just as you can quit anytime you wish.

Now, if you can understand this reality, then when you and others don't like how business operates, then YOU need to change something in YOUR life to make YOUR situation better for YOU...

 

You accepting that as a permanent given is why America is screwed from here on out. If their is no requirement for loyalty, than you must realize that rule of thumb applies completely across the board. If Chinese troops parachute in and ask where you are hiding, don't expect us not to tell them, for we OWE YOU NOTHING.

 

Come on...there are jobs for every single type of work and this will never change.

If you have one engineer, they will need support workers, someone will build and test the stuff they dream up, clients will consider the stuff, and all of those people buy food, and drive cars, and enjoy entertainment, need police and fire protection, and need facilities, and use energy, and need medical services, send their kids to school, and have their houses cleaned, and use dry cleaning, etc. etc. etc. all the while making demands on all levels of government.

When you have a CEO earning $5 million annually, just try to imagine the jobs pyramid that extends from this single person?! This one person might create 1000 jobs! Maybe 5000 jobs! And guess what...they will be every imaginable type of job...

 

In my opinion, if a person can go to college to better themselves and go into the job market to become a productive member of society more power to them and I applaud them for working for that degree to get a good job. I have a few problems with colleges though first, is that we put it into our kids heads now that they need to obtain the college experience and they should fund it through student loans. My sister for example got a masters degree in Sociology and got out of college with a mountain of debt and a job that averages only about 40k a year. For that education she will be paying off her student loans into her mid 40's it is not worth it in my opinion. Second, we have kids going to college today that have no business being there. I am all for higher education ,but we have people who would be much better off doing what I did in going into the military and getting a good trade or a technical school to get a good job skill. Which leads me into my Third problem, why do colleges require classes which do not pertain you your chosen degree? I heard the argument it is so you have a well rounded education" ,but I think 2 additional years with all that extra money people financed for a "well rounded educational college experience," is kinda ridiculous. Does it make someone smarter I don't really think so because there are different types of smart. So in short it is like everything else they have pros and cons to it and it also varies on what type of degree program and what it is worth to different people.

 

LOL.

Do you think that he creates that jobs?

The jobs are created by necessity. No more than that. The CEO is the less necessary position of all because it is unproductive position. And all unproductive jobs(not economically talking) are eliminable.

Yes, there are productive jobs that maybe don't give anything economically talking but are necessary, I am refering to the Arts, for example, to humanities... are things necessary.

But a boss, when is just enough with a worker or group of persons with enough ability in organization and gestion.