The College Education Scam

Rightwingpatriot.com ^ | April 1, 2014 | Rightwingerpatriot

[rightwingerpatriot]

For the last few decades, students have been fed a whopping lie. This falsehood is that you'll need a college education to succeed in the marketplace and have a successful job or career. To that end, enrollment has skyrocketed, and along with that surge has been the increase of price of going to college. To pay for college, students take out student loans and go massively into debt. The sad fact is that after graduation, they find themselves with a normally worthless degree and tens of thousands in the hole. They've fallen prey to the college education scam.

From 1985 to 2010, enrollment in colleges nearly doubled and with that came a huge influx of revenue for the colleges. As restrictions on student loans lessened, it became easier and acceptable for students to go massively into debt to fund their education. Colleges began to swell with idiotic courses and professors teaching nonsense such as trans-gender cultural biases through the medium of popular culture and other such junk. Tuition has skyrocketed because colleges know they can charge essentially whatever they want and students will just take out more loans to pay for it. In my home state of Florida, I paid $40 a credit hour in the early 1990s, Fast forward twenty years, that credit hour will now cost you $210 (if you're paying in-state tuition).

From kindergarten onward, the mantra of having to go to college is drummed into our heads. Only idiots forgo getting higher education. Studies are touted that show that college graduates earn $17,500 more per year than those who do not go to college. In my personal opinion, that stat is misleading on several levels. The first is that not all college degrees are equivalent. A person getting a medical degree or one in law will definitely be a high earner during the course of their lifetime. But if you look at other degrees, such as in the liberal arts, then those earnings plummet in comparison. In fact, we've been told that a college degree is our ticket to success, but the reality is that only a few degrees are worthwhile. Many degrees really aren't worth the paper they're printed on when you're out in the job market. Major in history, psychology, sociology, or literature, and find out where that gets you.

In fact, there are many high paying jobs that don't require a college degree. Plumbers have a median income of $49,000, while steelworkers earn $46,000. Car mechanics average $39,000 a year. These jobs can be learned in trade schools or through apprenticeship. The cost difference between a trade school and a four year college is astounding. Going to college averages $15,000 a year in total costs for in-state students at four year public institutions (the cost goes much higher for private colleges). In fact, the average bachelor's degree costs a grand total of $127,000. The average cost for going through a trade school is $33,000. When you compare trade school wages to college degree wages, trade schools average only $3,000 a year less than four year graduates. If you factor in being able to work two years earlier and the roughly $94,000 in savings in the cost of education, the argument that colleges are the only way to go falls apart.

We also have to consider student debt. Most students graduate with anywhere from $26,000 to $29,000 in debt. If you add in interest over the course of the debt's lifetime, the amount goes even higher. Right now, 70% of college students take out student loans to fund their education. The total amount of outstanding student loan debt is over a trillion dollars, higher than credit card or auto loan debts.

So why the college education scam? The easy answer is that it boils down to money. Colleges rake in billions by creating the false demand for college degrees. The government and other lending institutions make money by giving out student loans. The only person who gets screwed is the student. Once they enter the workforce, many find unable to get a job with their degree. Many jobs are not high-tech like we've been led to believe. In fact, the government has been trying to fill positions at Hoover Dam for years, but has had trouble due to the fact that the facility is low tech. My brother works at a hospital power plant that is run by boilers. He and his coworkers are all ex-Navy who learned their trade in the military and do not have a college degree.

The sad fact is that colleges do not prepare students for earning a living. They're only about enriching themselves as much as they possibly can. It's a wise decision to look at a two year school, the military, trade schools, or apprenticeships in order to learn a trade. We have a vast shortage of tradesmen in our country and those jobs pay damn well. Such facts are hidden as those in power wish to perpetuate the higher education scam in order to fatten their bank accounts. You don't need a college degree if you're capable, have a great idea, or are willing to work hard to succeed.

[rightwingerpatriot]

So what life choice that you made are you trying to justify, and why do you think one might be persuaded to make that same choice themselves?

I'm not attempting to justify any life choice. What I'm arguing for is that students decide for themselves based upon facts on what choices are best for them, as opposed to being told that they have to make Choice A or Choice B. One thing that I should have expanded on and what others have noted is the quality of student itself. If you're smart and willing to work hard, you can get a quality education no matter what path you take. My primary schooling was in a semi-rural district that the state frowned on as a whole. The education was considered sub-standard and the teachers poor. The reality was that most of the students didn't make an effort and the vast majority of parents didn't give a damn. My parents did and I got a great education. I was stunned when I got to college and saw how woefully unprepared many of my peers were.

[Agamemnon]

Your entire posting seems to belittle the accomplishment of degreed formal education. All programs are not equal but if you desire to do more than make toilets flush better for $49K/year, you'll need a decent college and graduate education.

It would have been a more relevant and a lot shorter posting had you simply stated the obvious earlier: I should have expanded on and what others have noted is the quality of student itself. If you're smart and willing to work hard, you can get a quality education no matter what path you take.

But if that was all you said, you might not have gotten in the dig, and that's where your posting generally failed.

I'm mechanically inclined, so I do plumbing that I need to do and work on a fleet of four 1970 Cadillacs, a 2004 deVille a 1995 Roadmaster, a 2003 Suburban and a 1976 MG each of which my company owns (and when I say my company, I mean -- I own the company).

I hold 2 undergraduate degrees in life sciences and 2 graduate degrees - one in a life science and another which is an MBA. Thesis degrees not just "more course work." My wife of 30 years and I have 4 kids: 2 who were Marines now doing college on the GI Bill, and 2 others who I made employees of my firm, pay them a salary, and from that they pay their own college education.

I could have gone to a trade school, and gotten the certification and maybe a union card, but I worked full time all my way through college to pay for it, and availed myself of company education sponsorships for the grad degrees earned in night school earlier in my career -- a routine company benefit. Yes, I could have gone to trade school, I suppose, but I wanted to do more

In the end I own my own firm, make 10x what that plumber does annually, and that is due in large part by getting the foundation in college and coupling that to hard work.

Yeah, I can do the plumbing and car repair/maintenance, and as much as I enjoy the handyman stuff, nowadays it's just a matter of time and whether in the end it's worth more to me to pay the guy making 49K a year to do it.

In the earlier days when I was a janitor, I earned a lot less, but that doesn't mean today it's somebody else's job to sweep the garage, swish the toilet, or mop the floor. I just knew early on that that was not what I wanted to do all my life so I got the college education necessary to do something better, more challenging and more to my liking for the long term.

Belittling college education is most often done by those who chose poorly - whether it is a major, a school, or whether they just simply didn't have the initiative to finish the schooling they may have started.

FReegards!