Is a College Degree Worth It?

The obvious correct answer to this question is that college is worth it for some people and not for others. However I (and you most likely), am not completely satisfied with that answer. Especially when those of you who think you fit into the first group of college bound or attending students, might not actually belong there.

We as a nation have been brainwashed our whole lives to believe that without a degree, you're chance of being successful drops down to about 1 degree above absolute zero. The fact that your even reading articles like this one would probably give your grandmother a heart attack. But the truth of the matter is that college for many, I dare even say, most people is just not worth it.

The people that most definitely should be going to college, are those in a driven pursuit of a professional degree. Be it a doctor, lawyer, engineer, or future CEO, if you're dream makes you big bucks, and helps progress humanity, then by all means, stop reading this article because the following information will do you no good. Ignorance, as they say, is bliss.

For those of you who plan on going to college for a liberal arts degree or the like, you might want to rethink. College is not what it used to be. In school and in society in general, college is seen as the path to success, or the ladder out of poverty. And it's true that at one time, for quite a long time, this was indeed the case. But like most things in this twisted world of ours, greed and the quest for monetary gain has greatly surpassed the admirable principles that used to define the higher education institutions. Nowadays they're much more interested in your money, or lack-there-of, than you're noble pursuit of an education and a better life.

In high school you saw (or still see for some) posters, or videos, or teachers that said that over a lifetime a college graduate makes $1,000,000 more than somebody who only finished high school. One Million. The number just rolls off the tongue. Before you can even finish saying it you've already started thinking about all the things you can buy with that extra million. If you're thinking about college as an investment (and you should be because that's what it is) then putting in the $40,000 now for a $1,000,000 later is a no-brainer. But the truth of the matter is, that the fabled one million is a statistical lie. It isn't incorrect per-say, but it is highly deceiving.

That one million you gain from college, is gained over a life time. Which is approximately a 40-50 year working time-spam. What they don't mention on the posters or videos, is that that one million takes into account the cost of inflation. Meaning that by the time your retirement rolls around, that one million is actually only worth about $400,000. After that you have to subtract the cost of college today, plus whatever interest was paid on student loans, and we're left with a number in the low $300,000 range. Granted, it is more. But not nearly close to million mark, and you had to give up 4 or more years of your life for schooling. And this is all only if you do get a well paying job out of college. Roughly 60% of graduates out of college have a full time job. Of those, roughly 65% are making $35,000 a year or less. Believe me, those people aren't even on the way to $300,000 extra. There's a family friend of ours who just got her degree from Texas A&M University in communications. Right now she lives in Austin as a waitress because she can't find work in her field.

Since 1985, inflation has gone up about 115%. That why things like gas cost a little over double what it did 25 years ago. Where it's $3.20 per gallon now, it used to be about $1.50. The price of college tuition however has skyrocketed to 500%. That's 5 times more than inflation, and I picked a low estimate. Some people estimate tuition to be 8 to 9 times higher than inflation.

Now of course the quality and some overhead costs will have gone up overtime. Some people try to attribute all of the price gain to this. But in reality, Both of those are covered under inflation. Some even argue that the quality has gone down, citing that what used to be an organization of the educated educating, is now a business run by administrators who make salaries akin to those of large companies. Classes in a 4 year state university today are taught mostly by graduate students working for wages at or near the minimum wage to try and start paying off their massive loans. And because the graduate students are willing to work for so little to pay their bills, intelligent professors with degrees and years of experience have no incentive come teach, because the pay is so low.

So if they pay teachers less, and the quality has only slight increased (arguably), why has tuition risen so high so quickly? Because it can. Student loans, are becoming the new housing market (pre-crisis). Higher tuition means lenders can give out money. They take that money repackage it, and sell it as secure investment saying that they're distributing the risk. Now they've sold, they have more money to lend, so the college or university jacks up tuition to get all that money too. The similarities to the housing market are frightening and unmistakable. The housing market called them Mortgage-backed Securities. Now they're called Student Loan Asset-backed Securities (SLABS), and these "safe" investments are marketed towards pension funds, and the elderly. And as of 2005, only about 40% of student loans were in active repayment, and 7% in default. By 2008 the default was to reach about 15%.

It means you have a pretty tough decision to make. I would suggest continuing to read articles, do research, and really see if your chosen profession is one where a degree is absolutely necessary. Another option is always to take that money and do something else with it. Invest it elsewhere, or use it to start your own small business. There are loads of ways to make money off of $50,000...

At the bottom I have a link to a very in-depth article if you're interested in even more detail.

http://nplusonemag.com/bad-education