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There were for years many renumerative jobs that were held by men which did not require a college education, i.e. jobs in manufacturing, policeman, fireman, and so forth.

These paid far better than "woman's work", such as clerical, hair stylist, waitress.

What is really telling is the response of men here, the hostility, and the accusation that I am anti-male just for pointing out some of the conditions under which woman operated.

happygrl, you got hostility for saying something that just AINT SO. That's the problem. I think the namecalling is a not appropriate from the other side, but it's only 'telling' you that maybe you overstated/misstated the point.

let's try to straighten out the record a bit:

It is as important if not more so for men to attain College degrees, more so than ever before as non-College work for men has declined in average pay, declined in size of total employment in recent decades. And it is likely more important for men than women, as men face fewer not more opportunities and prospects than women without such degrees.

The well-publicized 'advantages' to men in pay virtually disappear when you account for previous experience, actual work performed (how much you work), and difficulty and unpleasantness of the task.
For example: A construction worker working hard 8 hour shifts and facing job risks that give you the highest death rate among job classifications makes more than a secretary doing non-physically demanding work in a more pleasant work environment. The shocker is why this would surprise. But the other shocker is there are only so many 'blue-collar' type jobs and they certainly are not a panacea for men looking at careers, and that trends continue to favor more of the "service" type jobs and less of those "traditional male" jobs in mining, manufacturing etc. that can keep a family without doing college-level work. Such work has been automated away, for decades now. The trends only continue in that direction.

The gap between wages for college and non-college graduates is a yawning gap, and it is dangerous and foolish to suggest anyone capable of getting through college should forego it lightly.

Lastly, women have had one historical advantage of attaining some upward mobility without careers or higher education, via marriage to a husband with higher income. For men this tends to be much less so the case. A blue-collar male without a college degree and with low income is hardly attractive to a woman looking for marriage.

I do not know the stats on *family* income for the level of male v. female educational attainment, but I'd bet money that such stats would favor women (IOW, a woman w/out a college degree would be in a family with higher avg income than a man w/out a college degree).