Diametric post

College has always been known as a great way to increase your job prospects. There has been a persistent belief that one will be better off financially if one goes to college. However, in recent years, this belief has lost its luster. There has been a significant shift in consumer confidence in the value of a college degree within the last decade; according to a Gallup survey in 2015, 56 percent of Republican party voters had high confidence in higher education. That number dropped tremendously to 19 percent by 2023. Not only has college gotten more expensive, but the value of a college degree has also diminished as the percentage of the population with at least a bachelor’s degree has skyrocketed. College is still worth it and for multiple reasons.

With the rising number of college degree recipients, not having a degree makes you even less likely to compete in the job market. This is especially true when looking for highly competitive jobs that are likely to pay more. According to the Census Bureau, 23.5% of the population aged 25 and older possesses a bachelor’s degree as their highest degree. An additional 14.4% possess a more advanced degree. So, nearly 40% of Americans have, at a minimum, a bachelor’s degree.

With that said, unless you have a stellar track record, you are unlikely to find a good-paying job without a college degree. However, this is not to say it is impossible because there are several other options. Many companies are looking to expand their job openings to those without degrees, but the odds of someone being hired without a degree are low when competing against people who do have a degree. Having a degree is a status symbol. It tells an employer that you have the grit to put effort into completing something challenging. On paper, a degree says a little about someone’s work ethic and shows an employer that you are a committed person.

Some may question my logic and say you do not need a college degree to demonstrate grit. There will always be outliers: those who naturally possess an above-average amount of grit and will persist in accomplishing anything they set their mind to. However, those people are likely to do well whether they are in college or not. Most people are not like that. The famous examples of Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg dropping out of college and becoming billionaires are the exception, not the rule. For the rest of the population, they are not skipping college to build the next billion-dollar tech company.

A college degree is optional in a significant number of fields. Even tech companies are open to giving people without a degree a chance, given they possess the required skills. Additionally, many employers do not believe college graduates are prepared to enter the workforce when looking for work. Many graduates do not have the soft or hard skills that companies seek in an employee. However, when pitting a group of people against one another for a job, possessing a degree will still look better on paper than not having one. It is already excruciatingly challenging to get an entry-level job but to do so while competing against recent college graduates who may or may not have experience is even more daunting.

Granted, experience is paramount, but an 18-year-old fresh out of college is unlikely to have extensive experience. Without that experience, they will likely start a low-paying job where they may build up the skills necessary to work in higher-paying jobs. By the time they reach college graduate age, say around 22 years old, they will not have a college degree and will probably only have experience unsuited to any well-paying jobs. On the other hand, someone in college can work part-time in jobs similar to a non-college graduate, and they will have a degree in their name. Who is likely to look better on paper? At a minimum, a degree shows that you can learn at a higher level, which could prove beneficial when learning skills for a job. In addition, college graduates will have some skills that will be helpful in any job, such as writing.

A significant factor to consider when deciding if college is worth it or, more importantly, right for you is whether you have the right personality to go to college and finish it or are better suited to a field that does not require a degree. There are plenty of industries that offer a great starting income. For instance, almost anything in sales will provide you with a solid paycheck. However, sales jobs require a specific personality; not everyone will thrive in that environment. With the average sales conversion rate being in the low single digits, most people will lose hope that they will succeed. When your livelihood depends on your ability to persevere in the face of unrelenting odds, some will cave. Whether college is right for you truly depends on the individual.

Another alternative many present is trade jobs. There are likely too many people better suited towards getting into a hands-on manual labor job, such as those in the trades. Think of jobs such as plumbing and electrician. These jobs tend to take significantly less time to train for. In addition, many opportunities are available that provide on-the-job training. Why spend four years working to get a college degree when you can get a secure trade job? However, of the job openings in February 2024, a mere 1,056,000 people out of 8,756,000 were within industries that are predominately trades or manual labor, such as mining and construction. This means there are plenty of opportunities within the trades, but it only constitutes a quarter of the job openings available.

Some complain about the need to decide at the ripe age of 18 what they will do for the rest of their lives. That is not the case at all. However, I posit that this is not a recent phenomenon. Not long ago, children who had not even reached puberty were placed in apprenticeships with the expectation that it would be their career for life. I bring this up because there is a legitimate concern that many who enter college and graduate leave with a degree utterly unrelated to the industry they work in after graduating. On the flip side, if you consider the outlook for those who got training in the trades and are no longer working in their specialty, it would be tough to convert to another trade without additional training. If you have a degree, you can take that credential into other areas. With a college degree, you can pivot towards other sectors, so long as you are willing to put in the effort to acquire the necessary skills.

Regardless of your degree, there will always be a need to grow and adapt to the changing job market continually. Skills requirements are constantly changing due to the growing number of people who acquire those skills. Indeed, there is a lagging factor between the job market requirements and the skills taught within universities. Another consideration, though, is that far too many people are attending universities nowadays compared to the present need for the skills taught within universities. This brings up an interesting question of whether universities fail to adapt or if that failure comes from pre-college education. Without going too deep into it, there is likely a big-picture shift that has taken place within the job market that stems from a variety of factors, such as shipping manufacturing jobs overseas and the growing number of jobs that can be done virtually in a foreign country for significantly less. For instance, coding jobs are still in high demand, but many of the job requirements can likely be filled outside of America and for a much lower cost.

 Another factor to consider is macroeconomic resource management. Given that every individual capable of working can be viewed as a resource, is the country effectively utilizing its working population by having so many go to college? The years spent in college means time spent out of the workforce, at least for many. In addition, by incentivizing people to go to college, you risk diverting a portion of the population away from industries where they may be exceptionally talented. To expand on this thought, pre-college schools offering training in physical labor and trades have declined significantly over the last few decades. Never having the opportunity to try their hand at a trade skill, many people flock to college with the promise of a higher earning potential. Consequently, fewer are turning to trade skills for work immediately upon graduating high school.

Of course, this matters only if you factor in the cost of education and the expected return on investment from going to college. The average cost of a degree ranges from $104,000 for a public institution to $223,200 for private universities. With that said, college graduates tend to make significantly more money than high school graduates. According to the U.S. Career Institute, the median lifetime earnings of a bachelor’s degree recipient is nearly $1 million more than a high school graduate. If you were to take the difference between the extra lifetime earnings versus the cost of the degree, there would be a significant difference between the cost versus the return on investment of a degree. However, it is not that simple because many graduates must receive loans to pay for their degrees.

There is a significantly lower discrepancy in the difference in wealth over one’s lifetime between college graduates and non-graduates. In other words, the wealth gains accumulated from going to college are incredibly low amongst college graduates compared to the rest of the population. The most likely factor contributing to this low wealth premium is student loans. The cost of going to college has ballooned, thus diminishing the overall return on investment.

Despite the increasing cost of college and the lower marginal rate of return for attending it, graduating is still worthwhile because of the various intrinsic factors that emerge from attending college. Learning to learn is an essential skill to possess and will pay dividends regardless of the field one enters. In addition, according to a study published in the Journal for Social Science and Medicine, the mental health of college graduates is better than those who do not obtain a college degree.

Even if there are still benefits to attending college, it is still pertinent for schools to consider adapting to the modern-day skills the job market is looking for from graduates. If that means universities need to start considering more trades-type jobs to teach, then so be it. Unfortunately, so many students nowadays graduate with degrees in fields they are doubtful to find a job in. That means students with enormous amounts of debt will enter the workforce and be forced to take on jobs that pay far lower than they were expecting to earn. College is worth it and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future, but it is still essential for students to consider their major wisely. Otherwise, they will pay the consequence of a lifetime of student debt and lower wages.