Current Events > Are college degrees even worth it?

(+) Yeah! (+)

You could go learn welding or plumbing for a fraction of the cost of a college degree and make tons more money.

i only have an associates and i make $40 an hour

Nah

absolutely
study hard
get in debt
work a bad job that crushes your spirit
enhance the lives of the ceo

Absolutely, but it depends on what field you are studying to reap the most benefits such as salary potentia/cap, job availability, stability.

You can never go wrong with STEM. Science, tech, engineering, and medical.

Besides that.. business, or law maybe?

I went with liberal arts bachelor's degree and by my senior year, I knew I didn't want to get a masters and do field work or teach. There wasn't even that many jobs available. When I graduated I thought I could get a comfortable government office job, making 50k,.but noope. went through like dozen in person interviews. for.b.s jobs. Eventually worked at a printing press for 3 months, but that was horrible (besides grave hours, couldn't go to school because of weekly shifting schedules) and then eventually to data entry. I thought I could "settle" for $13 an hour, and thank God I got tired of it after a year. So I worked part time there and went into tech full time as a student at a local cc, and got into the field 1.5 years later. Best career decision I've made. Also dodged a bullet by not enrolling in heald college doing IT, before it went down under

It's ridiculous how much expensive school is nowadays, but STEM and/or business is worth it.
I can't say anything about vocational schools, as I have no experience.

Think about what field you could see yourself enjoying doing for potentially the rest of your life. like how it makes you feel, what skills you can develop to make yourself more valuable, and the bigger picture of it all (is it a field helping humanity/the world, for example?

Assuming you live in the u.s., If you wanna save money and go for STEM, get into a CC for your first two years to save money (and live with parents if you have to). Speak with a counselor to get into an program to transfer into a university after. Work a part time job if you can.

A bachelor's in general will open you up with more jobs and higher pay than anything under.

I'm highly allergic to welds and piping. I don't have the option to get into those trades

For a lot of people they aren't worth it. It just depends. One thing is for sure, just being a dedicated worker can land you plenty of jobs that can support a family.

I have a BBA and make a little over $50K in retail marketing. My friend has a Masters in egineering and he's making $100K+ driving a cement mixer. I'm kind of thinking about getting my Class B so I can join him. Sure, he has to work a couple Saturdays a month, and sometimes has 10 hour days, but he's making bank.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

You can be smart without being educated in much the same way that you can be educated and dumb. Education gives you the opportunity to learn new things and being smart is how apt you are at learning them.

Oreos74 posted...

i only have an associates and i make $40 an hour

How?

Oreos74 posted...

i only have an associates and i make $40 an hour

Doin what?

kelemvor posted...

Sure, he has to work a couple Saturdays a month, and sometimes has 10 hour days, but he's making bank.

This is mostly what I went to school to avoid, and I ended up with 70k/yr, hybrid remote, 40 hours max, which I'm content with

I was more interested in the flexibility of working schedule/wfh that school could offer me than a large salary

I have an associate and make $35 an hour

Depends on the degree and wether or not it suits your personality. It also depends what you do with it or what skills you pick up, the paper alone can only do so much for you

xlr_big-coop posted...

Depends on the degree and wether or not it suits your personality. It also depends what you do with it or what skills you pick up, the paper alone can only do so much for you

The paper opens up more jobs and can give you a higher base salary than someone with a less advanced degree. People with masters can get into jobs with less years if experience required from a job posting.

Of course the field matters and what you plan to do with it as well. Some fields are less bang for your buck with master degrees.

IT supposedly only requires a handful of certificates, and theres a Youtube channel called Professor Messer that teaches all the CompTIA stuff free of charge.

Some of them are, but many of them dont get you as far as they got the previous generations.

Liu_Kano posted...

IT supposedly only requires a handful of certificates, and theres a Youtube channel called Professor Messer that teaches all the CompTIA stuff free of charge.

why hire states side for IT when they can outsource to a 3rd world for $5 an hour?

Billyionaire posted...

You could go learn welding or plumbing for a fraction of the cost of a college degree and make tons more money.

This is generally true. Blue collar workers with skills and experience can make bank. There's often a lot of wear and tear on their bodies though.

I think the appeal of college degrees is getting an office job. Some people aren't cut out to get their hands dirty. They often don't start out with a lot. I've been looking on indeed and seeing entry level jobs requiring a degree starting as low as $18 an hour lol

LeoRavus posted...

This is generally true. Blue collar workers with skills and experience can make bank. There's often a lot of wear and tear on their bodies though.

I think the appeal of college degrees is getting an office job. Some people aren't cut out to get their hands dirty. They often don't start out with a lot. I've been looking on indeed and seeing entry level jobs requiring a degree starting as low as $18 an hour lol

chat GPT is designed to take away white collar jobs

DOOM-64 posted...

chat GPT is designed to take away white collar jobs

Honestly some white collar jobs don't even need to exist. It's just some formality. Like HR has the HR manager and HR assistant. The assistant from what I see does absolutely everything. Everyone goes to her. She holds all the meetings with employees.

I don't know wtf the manager even does. He's not there most of the time

Nah. It's all about the connections.

I enjoyed getting my degrees. Im not talking about the university experience, though I enjoyed that too, but saying that I actually enjoyed studying the subjects that I chose.

I also enjoy my job (which I would not be eligible for without a degree) and it pays well. Seems worth it to me.

You can learn a lot.

honestly a degree on its own isnt usual super useful just on its own. There are exceptions but really even with a degree its often just who you know and it takes a lot of social networking to get ahead

What do you want to do? Some jobs require a specific degree (eg accountants, lawyers, doctors, psychologists).

Id argue a lot of engineering jobs, if not most also require a degree? I dont mean computer stuff, I mean stuff like, working on bridges, sky scrappers, controlled demolition, NASA stuff, etc, that kind of engineering