Happiness is important. However it isn’t just about money. It’s about having choices. An education exposes you to new ideas and new opportunities. I suppose it comes down to a decision between more money and more opportunities but more stress and higher expectations to perfom vs less stress and lower expectations, but less money, more prone to layoffs and less less control over your career.
They don’t have to be lazy or stupid. But just not as ambitious or competetive enough. It’s all relative.
I know people making a good wage after 2 year programs in:
I don’t know anyone personally who has taken the following, but seeing as the above list came from the same institution I’ll assume they wouldn’t be offered if people couldn’t find jobs:
When I was young I was totally sold on the concept of university, but when I was in my first year of it, I realized what I really wanted to do and went for my 2 year diploma. I don’t regret it at all. It’s the same education I would have gotten in university but without gen ed requirements. Maybe the US needs to shift to a mindset of tech schools where when it comes to what you’re studying, it’s the same quality of education but only with the classes relevant to your career. Two years cost around $15k and I lived at home.
Doctors and lawyers will always need advanced education. But that guy working on the lines at Ma Bell could do it with a year or two of specialized training.
I’ve started a poll to discuss the actually prevalence/utility of minority-specific financial assistance.
I don’t think it is. I think all that is refuted is she can’t go to college RIGHT NOW. And even then, there is probably a single mom working two jobs taking online classes one class at a time and working on her degree out there to prove it can be done.
I don’t think its always WISE for everyone to invest the time and money in a degree - a lot of aid is in loans, and I don’t think a college degree is a guarantee to a good job. But with ample community colleges out there, lots of loans available, colleges that cater to people who are within the normal range of intelligence, online courses…I think if you REALLY WANT to go to college you probably can - it may be exhausting, you may have to stop and start over the course of years, you may take one class at a time, but dogged determination and an IQ at least in the average range is enough for you to be able to go - and probably even get through an associates degree. But unless you REALLY WANT it - why would you do that? There are probably better investments in themselves for most people (in time and money) for anyone willing to work that hard.
I’d love to get more education, just because I like learning new stuff. What I’d really like is a chance to once again roam that huge library, look up anything that interests me and learn so much about it my friends marvel at all the useless sh*t I’ve committed to memory.
FWIW, there is something of a movement to encourage some kids to enter vocational/technical programs when they’re not academically suited for a four-year college. If they want to go on for the whole enchilada, they can do that when they’re more capable of handling it.
A lot of folks are not into school. For them, a few years of college is just further delay.
A lot of folks are not up to school. For them, a few years of college is just further frustration.
Distance/online/open education presents opportunities for people who are burdened with responsibilities in their lives that prevent regular attendance at college.
Agreed. And I think it’s sad that we live in a society where college is almost necessary just to meet basic needs. Some people are talented in other ways. But because of the way our system is structured, people ask, ‘‘Why didn’t you go to college?’’ instead of "How is it that someone can work three jobs and barely make ends meet in one of the wealthiest countries in the world?‘’ I think the college argument is just a red herring for a much more serious and pervasive problem with social mobility.
I grew up with a close-knit extended family with ten first cousins (including me and my immediate siblings) on my father’s side. Of us ten, only two went to college. I was one of the two.
The other eight could have easily gone to college; for the most part, their parents had the money, and would have been willing to pay for everything. But each was either too lazy to go, or just wanted to party and have fun after HS.
Is it? I know a couple guys who work in print shops - no secondary education. A few guys who are contractors - roofers, tilers,painters - no secondary education.
If you don’t consider trade school to be college, I know people who are plumbers and mechanics and hair stylists who meet basic needs (my neighbor across the street is a stylist, owns her own shop, and is pretty well off).
Have a friend who used to drive city bus - no college. That paid pretty well.
I live in a mixed area - and a lot of my son’s baseball team are blue collar families. Warehouse workers and welders, courier service drivers. They do ok.
I dunno. I did a recent project researching wage-earners I came into contact with and the incomes were shockingly low to me -construction workers, bank tellers, home aides, etc. It could be a geographically-specific thing. But I think it’s pretty telling that most of the people who receive food donations work full-time, and that the poverty rate in this country is significantly higher than the unemployment rate. I understand that not all jobs that pay well require extensive education, but it just chaps my ass that any job in the U.S. doesn’t at least cover basic needs. Whether you work at McDonald’s or the Pentagon you should be able to afford insurance and rent and food. I realize not everyone sees it that way but I don’t think the penalty for laziness or lack of ambition or oppression or whatever it is should be an early grave and sick children.
Unionism can help address low income and poor working conditions in industries in which the supply of workers outstrips the demand, as well as set up cooperative financial institutions and education funds to assist members and their families in getting educations.
Shockingly low, perhaps. But “unable to meet basic needs.” Not necessarily.
The people I know who work in print shops own homes. I have two uncles who spent their lives as contractors - one is about to retire to Hawaii. One of my son’s friend’s dad is a courier - small, but pleasant home in a good neighborhood, family is fed, serviceable cars in the garage. I’d guess all make more than my friend who has a MLS and is a full time librarian (with huge student loan debt on top of the little tiny income you get as a public servant in a library.)
Higher education is a path to a living wage job. It isn’t the only path, and in itself, it is not a sufficient path.
olivesmarch4th You don’t think there should be jobs for kids still being supported by their parents but want to earn extra money? You realize that if wages for everything were raised enough so that one person working at McDonalds (as an example) could afford an apartment, a car, and all the rest of an adult life, the cost of everything would be correspondingly raised, so those people still couldn’t afford it.
I think there’s supposed to be some incentive to better one’s self. That incentive is usually money. Even working a pink-collar clerical job at about $10/hr, I was able to afford a used car, a mortgage for a tiny house, a couple pets, health insurance and to feed myself. There wasn’t much left over, but I did it. Now I still have a used car (184K miles - woo hoo!), more pets, a bigger farm and I put a lot more into savings. I still don’t spend unwisely, I don’t drink, smoke, have credit card debt, or live beyond my means.
I have a teen-aged kid doing some work on my fences right now. He said he just got a job working nights as a janitor for minimum wage at the local state university. I told him he probably would qualify for free tuition as an employee, but he isn’t interested. So he works on the weekends making extra money. Hopefully he’ll get tired enough of earning minimum wage that he’ll either find a better job (the warehouse workers for my company start at about $11/hr) or a better education.
StG
Cousin A: “What? Go to college? And leave my BOYFRIEND???” :rolleyes:
Cousin B: “What? Go to college? I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up!”
Cousin A got knocked up, of course, got married, two more to follow, and they all live in one of those brick apartment buildings with those untreated-wood balconies you always see from the highway. They’ve got McJobs and the support of their parents and seem happy enough. Cousin B is still growing up, thinkin’ on it. I truly do believe college isn’t for everyone, there’s no guarantee of a job, and after I spent a week in NYC during a trash strike, believe one trash collector is worth 50 guys in suits, sitting up there in an office in a glass skyscraper.
Really? I’ve had many students over the years–more in recent years–who were practically illiterate or innumerate and had sucky GPAs at best, yet they still managed to get into college and university. It didn’t go too well.
The challenge, IMHO, is to find work that you can do for decades that you find at least somewhat meaningful, not too terribly annoying and have at least somewhat of an aptitude for. Fortuantely there’s all sorts of work requiring all sorts of skill and education levels.
The reason we encourage kids to go to college is because in general, more education is better than less. I was never a terribly good student, but I am certainly better off both professionally and personally for having gone through four years of undergrad and several more of business school. What people want for their life at 18 is often very different when they are 38. However, it is a lot harder to make those sort of changes later on.
Well, I guess that’s the ideological issue at the root of this thread. Can anyone achieve social mobility if they work hard enough? I achieved social mobility, and it sounds like you did too, but I don’t see that anyone can. My perspective is perhaps affected by the fact that I work in a high-poverty area (2nd highest in the country, actually) where people work incredibly hard but just have so much going against them. I think everyone has a limit, and I see people pushed to those limits all the time.
It’s kind of like the weight loss debate. Can anyone lose weight and keep it off? Maybe, in theory. But I think it’s far more relevant that 95% of the people who try fail.
With smarts and gumption, a physically and mentally healthy person in a first world country can get ahead in life. The problem arises when a person does not have these characteristics.