# Why is a degree needed this badly in today's economy?



## dark_angel (Oct 21, 2013)

Good paying jobs require a college degree. Some call it the new high school diploma. Before, one could get by as middle class on one income and all that's required is high school. Now even college grads are having trouble finding decent work. What happens to those with school phobia who is glad just to finish high school and go straight to work? How do ppl support themselves on $10 an hour? Fuck school. This isn't fair.


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## AriesLilith (Jan 6, 2013)

10$ per hour, converting to € is +-7.24€. That x8 hours per day for some 22 days is 1274.24€. When I started working here at Portugal (graduated at computer science and started working as a programmer), I had 1250€ + 6.5€ per day for lunch money, and I had to pay taxes from these that I received +- 1050€ per month. And this is already your above average income, not to mention the minimum national wage is around <500€ minus taxes.
Out of curiosity, is life in US expensive??

As for your question... I guess that a course's worth depends on the field we are talking about, there are very demanding fields that requires specialized knowledge certified with stricter standards like engineering, medical, and some other fields. A course not only serves to prepare the grafuates with proper knowledge (acknowledged as standards), but also serves to show that a graduate overcame the minimum requirements of the university.

Commenting as a professional and graduate of the IT field here in my country, I can see why bigger companies almost exclusively hires graduates for higher jobs, for the reasons I have listed. Of course, a professional that has years of experience probably proved his or her capacities, and then graduates might not necessarily be capable of handling the jobs correctly. But a diploma still is seen as proof that the professional satisfied the minimum standards required (same applies as other certifications one gains through the career path).

Although on the other hand, this is what applies here where I live and we don't have those crazy prices for courses like the US do. Students here can still pay their courses by working part-time, and not end up with crazy debts, so I can kind of understand why it's not fair in the US. :/ And in an ideal world, everyone would be able to pursue further specialized knowledge in the area they like.

But here in Portugal it still depends on the field, that getting a degree might not be too helpful in some fields.


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## athenian200 (Oct 13, 2008)

dark_angel said:


> Good paying jobs require a college degree. Some call it the new high school diploma. Before, one could get by as middle class on one income and all that's required is high school. Now even college grads are having trouble finding decent work. What happens to those with school phobia who is glad just to finish high school and go straight to work? How do ppl support themselves on $10 an hour? Fuck school. This isn't fair.


Well, a lot of those jobs were in the manufacturing sector, and we don't do nearly as much manufacturing. Most of it is no longer human intensive, because we've got machines for those jobs. What little manufacturing does require humans is either outsourced to China, or else it involves the ability to manipulate certain machines. Not to mention, a lot of red tape has been created requiring people to be licensed/certified for a lot of jobs that didn't require it before, and most companies won't pay to train you. So they force you to pay for your own training before they'll consider hiring you, more or less.

It's kind of like a reverse Industrial Revolution. The Industrial Revolution built up cities and economies because it created many low-skill jobs so that thousands had the opportunity to leave their farms and come to the city for work.

Well, that's coming to an end. We have more than enough people to fill those jobs, and we've gotten more efficient at automating the more routine tasks that any warm body could accomplish. Now, if you want a place in society, you have to demonstrate creativity, leadership, or people skills. At the very least, you need specialized skills and certifications. Anything easy enough that you don't need a degree for it, a machine can probably do it.

The modern workplace demands a higher level of intelligence and education. The government really needs to extend the public education system into trade schools and 4-year colleges. They need to start preparing students to actually participate in the modern workforce rather than giving them an obsolete education and leaving it to their families to pay for making them into viable modern workers.


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## Tridentus (Dec 14, 2009)

It's because of the changing shape of economy. "Western" economies are declining rapidly in terms of manufacturing and general exports. This is particularly true where I live in the UK, where the shape has changed from a manufacturing dominated economy to a service economy within the last few decades. This is possible because manufacturing and labour has moved _overseas_, as a part of the process of globalization. We now live in a globalized economy, where you can't just account for the upper, middle and lower tiers of a single nation, you have to accommodate how that nation relates to the rest of the world, in particular with multi-national corporations and cheap overseas labour.

This means that whilst western nations hoard a majority of wealth, it actually has a deficit of jobs. Technology also contributes to this. _*Therefore..*_ where there was once a proportion of skilled to unskilled workers within nations, it has now become the case that within a western economy more people than ever before must now turn to _skilled_ work as this is the new shape of the economy. However, there simply isn't the need for _that many_ skilled workers, so you now get a current reality where everyone needs to gain skills/qualifications in order to compete for the existing jobs in the economy because of how it is structured.

Basically, where once you would go to university if you were upper middle class, and fill lower class jobs if you were labour class- cheap labour abroad and advances in technology have taken up a significant amount of that class, and now the majority of citizens within wealthy countries have _become_ a sort of middle class within this newly extended globalized entity.

_*Welcome to the broken nature of the Capitalist system of profit motivation. *_


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## MNiS (Jan 30, 2010)

Do you want to be planning for today or for five to ten years from now? The US economy today is relatively poor because the country has been slowly recovering from the worst economic recession since the Great Depression. Once the sentiment changes the economy will pick up again and do you want to be stuck with only a high school degree with a capped earning potential or have at least a college degree that adds value to you as a person once the economy does start to pick up?

That's what you should be asking yourself because the economy isn't going to be poor forever.


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## FearAndTrembling (Jun 5, 2013)

The biggest employers in 1950s America were places like GE, Ford, and National Steel. Today, they are Walmart and Target. It isn't just manufacturers thats are being hurt either, but small business. Which is middle class. A few decades ago, you could have a one family own a grocery store, another a tv store, another a pharmacy, another an auto parts store, another a hardware store, another a shoe store, etc. etc. But now a place like Walmart sells all those things, at cheaper prices. So they destroy all these middle class businesses. 

So, both manufacturing, and small business, which were the heart of the middle class, have basically been destroyed. 

There are too many people in college too. Community colleges are even starting to turn people away. Then, when you have a degree, you can get caught in the pickle of being passed over for "lower" jobs, because they think you are overqualified, and will leave as soon as something better comes up.


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## Sovereign (Aug 19, 2011)

Degrees have been watered down because of subsidies. Non-skilled labor is not a good thing to sell, with or without a degree. 

Gain a skill and use it is my advice, or become an entrepreneur if you can find some capital. Don't work retail, foodservice, or other non-skilled jobs for too long; we're in the process of replacing those workers with robots, and the market's only going to contract.


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## LibertyPrime (Dec 17, 2010)

MNiS said:


> Do you want to be planning for today or for five to ten years from now? The US economy today is relatively poor because the country has been slowly recovering from the worst economic recession since the Great Depression. Once the sentiment changes the economy will pick up again and do you want to be stuck with only a high school degree with a capped earning potential or have at least a college degree that adds value to you as a person once the economy does start to pick up?
> 
> That's what you should be asking yourself because the economy isn't going to be poor forever.


o.o if you guys don't really produce...then how are you going to give the US population jobs? A lot of people don't take to the kind of education most service jobs require and production has moved to China, Taiwan, India, Eastern EU, Western Russia, Africa etc. A US worker will not do the 2 $ an hour job a chinese person who produces the same quality component :\..and corporations will keep outsourcing these jobs to other countries where the population is desperate enough to work for pocket change....plus a good portion of the population in non western countries is highly educated and skilled :/...they are migrating towards the west and better job opportunities. Competition is on it's way, many of these people speak several languages to boot :| I'm one of them ffs! Lamo.

For example a Romanian doctor would have to be borderline insane to actually want to work in the country after a while considering conditions and pay here & in the west.

Small business is also kind of dead, if its dead here its kind of the same in the west or worse..


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## MNiS (Jan 30, 2010)

FreeBeer said:


> o.o if you guys don't really produce...then how are you going to give the entire population jobs? A lot of people don't take to the kind of education most service jobs require and production has moved to China, Taiwan, India, Eastern EU, Western Russia, Africa etc. A US worker will not do the 2 $ an hour job a chinese person who produces the same quality component :\..and corporations will keep outsourcing these jobs to other countries where the population is desperate enough to work for pocket change....plus a good portion of the population in non western countries is highly educated and skilled :/...they are migrating towards the west and better job opportunities. Competition is on it's way.


The worst of the effects of outsourcing happened in the early 2000s so all of the jobs that were going to leave the country have left long ago so that's a bit of an issue that's already occurred unless you work in IT or some other technology sector. I happen to live in California which has a huge pharmaceutical and aerospace industry and most big pharma and government contractors are hesitant to outsource due to IP protection and security concerns.

Maybe you should consider an industry that does more tech transfer than outsourcing? I'd hate to think how stressful it'd be to constantly worry about my job being outsourced.


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## MNiS (Jan 30, 2010)

FreeBeer said:


> Small business is also kind of dead, if its dead here its kind of the same in the west or worse..


Really? It's the opposite here. 

For every multinational corporation there are probably thousands of small and medium sized companies doing the exact same thing or in support of the large companies.

But then again, healthcare and medicine is more than likely the next growth industry in the US. I can't say that'd be the same for other western countries.


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## LibertyPrime (Dec 17, 2010)

MNiS said:


> Maybe you should consider an industry that does more tech transfer than outsourcing? I'd hate to think how stressful it'd be to constantly worry about my job being outsourced.


I'm not worried because they already outsourced jobs here....plus I'm a sysadmin...and after last week's Windows xp and printer fiasco they can outsource this shit and their ungrateful " \ o / I need my programs & the database up and running by Monday, so you better work all weekend!!...and NO we are NOT upgrading the hardware or the software this year! No you can't have a raise either, we are in recession!" 

...I swear I felt like stabbing someone today...also like quitting...:\, but we made it.

Try explaining IT to a computer illiterate boss and an upper management who freaks out when their desktop icons get accidentally auto arranged...



MNiS said:


> Really? It's the opposite here.
> 
> For every multinational corporation there are probably thousands of small and medium sized companies doing the exact same thing or in support of the large companies.
> 
> But then again, healthcare and medicine is more than likely the next growth industry in the US. I can't say that'd be the same for other western countries.


Hmm, over here they got killed by the supermarkets and other big providers.  we have american potatoes thou...even if they cost like 5 times the price of local ones and nobody buys them :\.* I'm from Transylvania-Romania dude.*


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## theflame (Apr 12, 2014)

I'm looking to be an entrepreneur in the end, OP. It's the only way to get paid what you're worth and you don't need a degree to be validated to start your own business, just a proper license. I have many Information Technology skills/knowledge and if I work through someone else, they want to pay me $8 to $10/hr. Is that even fair? I once applied for a full time IT position and asked for $16/hr and they never called me back so screw that.

The only thing with being an entrepreneur is I suck at marketing so I would need someone else to help me market what I sell. I think I was always meant to be an entrepreneur, that's why it's never worked out with anyone and I'm nearing thirty years old never held a full time job and I'm tired of going to temp services and never getting hired in after three months of being somewhere.

It depends on what your college degree is. I graduated with a Bachelors and still haven't found a dream job that they speak of once you graduate with a degree. Maybe it's my area because all that's around for me is manufacturing.


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## laura palmer (Feb 10, 2014)

yeah it sucks. even if you study a hard science, you might not find work. it all depends on luck tbh. i mean, my dad got an engineering diploma in the 80's because he was new to Canada and just did some random program, and now he makes a lot of money (we paid the mortage off in 5 years)
And too many people are in college, so even if youre the smartest in your school or class, then there are also another thosand "smartest" students, so you are a grain of sand.

i am trying to open up an etsy shop were I sell some nice sewn things, so I hope that grows into a good side buisness or whatever.
but trades are were its at imo. 
or if you want a job that _will always be in business_, get into funeral services lol


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## xisnotx (Mar 20, 2014)

it's just that...everyone has a degree...
so, either you buck the trend and come up with a way that will get you money...(like, no one can do this...it's the exception, not the rule...)
or you just swallow hard and get it. 

if you expect to make a living being employed...you better have the credentials to prove you deserve the job more than the next guy..

not a degree, necessarily, but at least something..


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## Eggsies (Feb 5, 2013)

Cause the debt of your student loans ensures that *you'll never leave.*


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## SuperDevastation (Jun 7, 2010)

Egoism and power hunger.


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## Uralian Hamster (May 13, 2011)

Why do people assume having a degree is needed to make a decent income? University used to be for intellectuals who had the means to study in a certain field and the legitimate interest to contribute to it. The motivation has shifted from this goal to one that focuses on money. Some fields require undergrads to do lab work and such, but nowadays the requirements for these positions can be acquired by getting an associates degree/diploma.


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## MNiS (Jan 30, 2010)

FreeBeer said:


> I'm not worried because they already outsourced jobs here....plus I'm a sysadmin...and after last week's Windows xp and printer fiasco they can outsource this shit and their ungrateful " \ o / I need my programs & the database up and running by Monday, so you better work all weekend!!...and NO we are NOT upgrading the hardware or the software this year! No you can't have a raise either, we are in recession!"
> 
> ...I swear I felt like stabbing someone today...also like quitting...:\, but we made it.
> 
> Try explaining IT to a computer illiterate boss and an upper management who freaks out when their desktop icons get accidentally auto arranged...


Stories like that are why I'm glad I didn't go into IT. No offense. I got my A+ certification when I was 15 and I was super into it until I started dealing with the average computer illiterate person. It was even worse at the time because there was a negative stigma attached to being technologically inclined which doesn't exist today.



> Hmm, over here they got killed by the supermarkets and other big providers.  we have american potatoes thou...even if they cost like 5 times the price of local ones and nobody buys them :\.* I'm from Transylvania-Romania dude.*


and Walmart is driving the supermarkets out of business here.  I don't like shopping at the mega stores though as I don't like the type of people who shop there plus I got robbed outside of one before. >:| So I'd probably stick to membership stores for the bigger places.

Globalization is happening though. Maybe not for potatoes but the computer or smartphone/tablet you're typing on wasn't sourced locally.


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## Coburn (Sep 3, 2010)

If you forego education, you need to supplement it with either good work experience and/or a strong portfolio of work.

The latter is harder (because it requires self motivation with no external structure to support you).

But I do know people who have excellent careers/pay without college (note: they all work as programmers).


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## Vic (Dec 4, 2010)

It's a quick way to assess somebody's relative value.


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## somnuvore (Sep 27, 2013)

A degree was needed in yesterday's economy; yesterday's economy was all about what you know. Today's economy is all about what you can _do._ Get used to making your own job because the world economy is still squeezing its butt closed and none of the older generations intend to give up their jobs for you silly young people wasting your time on liberal arts.

A degree is "needed" in today's economy to put an end to young competition. Same reason why there's a minimum wage, unions, regulations stacked on regulations so on and so forth. Same reason why tuition is going up and up and up. What you're experiencing is called cronyism, and if you're not one of the kool korporations, you're SOL.


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## Frenetic Tranquility (Aug 5, 2011)

Supply and demand of jobs. It's the inevitable byproduct of a society with increasing technology, that the only new jobs will be jobs that require you to learn things. Welcome to the new age.

Survival of the fittest, but at least the price to be paid isn't death.


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## StElmosDream (May 26, 2012)

Containment and labelling purposes. Recently considering tangible and intangible transferrable skills; before 2005 people could rightfully say I am an engineer with 10 years experience where it matters, post 2008 people suddenly needed to justify talents under a banner of scarcity in employment (yet ironically those still without degrees remained mistrustful of degree versus job education).

As someone with one degree looking to change to another I keep finding that desirable skills and experiences change, maintaining an employers market mentality; at one point not having a degree was detrimental to job seeking, then the next poor maths and abstract testing abilities became more harmful*, while now finding I have a first degree but still little job experience with companies seeking 'brightest stars' or people more likely to need less job coaching just based upon educational background rather than actual competencies one can bring to a company.

*Finding that little actual problem solving or deeper questioning has even taken place aside from noticing how dyslexic thinking and learning can be far removed from 'normal testing ranges of ability' or 'what every potential employee should know', even as someone used to strategic thinking and leading others in studies previously.

In the UK for example incentivising is taking place more often with the government paying companies to hire people. Irrespective of degree competencies things do seem unclear when many skills can be learned or taught on the job yet few companies seem to wish to invest in people, while complaining that loyalty is at an all time low (the irony).


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## Razare (Apr 21, 2009)

dark_angel said:


> What happens to those with school phobia who is glad just to finish high school and go straight to work? How do ppl support themselves on $10 an hour? Fuck school. This isn't fair.


$10 per hour is really good pay from where I'm from. No, it's not enough to really live on, so people live together to make it.

My friend dropped out of college and makes probably $40 - $50k per year. He did it by demonstrating his experience, and getting a job before the 2008 crash.

Jobs were easier to get back then.

Still, there are jobs you can get which are good, just based on experience alone.

In my job-hunt, I saw many accounting related jobs that did not require a degree, which paid 12 to 15 an hour.

More important than a degree is experience. Yet, once you have experience, having a degree is what gets you the better jobs. It's when the two are combined that it really benefits you to have a degree.

I got my experience by working at a place as a gas station clerk. When my employer found out I had a degree in accounting, I became their full charge bookkeeper.

So one way to get the right experience is to find a place where you can move up in the company.


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## laura palmer (Feb 10, 2014)

10$ an hour? Wow, my first job working at a kids hair salon paid more then that. I think experience and being an overall nice person is needed. More people should go into trades. Like, there are no truckers any more, we need truckers. People today can be really picky when choosing jobs. I watched a news segment yesterday on how canadian born canadians do not want food services jobs, so they hire temporary foreign workers to do so. People need to do better career planning.
My tiny university has a Bach of Ed program (its only grad program) and a lot of undergrads want to go into it regardless of the fact that the local education system never hires new teachers. A lot of people who would want to be teachers could be social workers or speech pathologists. People need to look outside the box


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## Belzy (Aug 12, 2013)

Zibziby said:


> 10$ an hour? Wow, my first job working at a kids hair salon paid more then that. I think experience and being an overall nice person is needed. More people should go into trades. Like, there are no truckers any more, we need truckers. People today can be really picky when choosing jobs. I watched a news segment yesterday on how canadian born canadians do not want food services jobs, so they hire temporary foreign workers to do so. People need to do better career planning.
> My tiny university has a Bach of Ed program (its only grad program) and a lot of undergrads want to go into it regardless of the fact that the local education system never hires new teachers. A lot of people who would want to be teachers could be social workers or speech pathologists. People need to look outside the box


People need to look outside the box... is kinda difficult when we live in created societies where degrees usually make the difference whether you get or get not a job. You have a degree in [something] and you either get a job in that [something] or they don't need/want you and you have a very hard time finding something else, or unless, you are willing to take a job where you get paid very little for awful and hard work with little respect and little appreciation.


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## lifeisanillusion (Feb 21, 2011)

Depends where you live. Where I am, getting a trade will most likely give you more job prospects and higher wages than getting a degree.


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## Scrabbletray (Apr 27, 2014)

The "why" is pretty simple. The world economy is becoming more and more globalized and just the past couple of decades have seen over a billion people in places like China and India start competing in the global work force. Obviously, most of these people aren't highly skilled, so most of them are competing for non-skilled jobs. This increase in supply of labor has caused an inevitable decrease in the wages paid to unskilled labor. A degree is needed to differentiate you from the masses of unskilled labor so that you can earn a decent wage. The income gap between a person with a degree and a person without has never been higher in US history. People who tell you a degree is worthless are doing you a huge disservice. It's true that the value of a degree in absolute terms has decreased because of the struggling economy, but the value of a degree relative to no degree has continued to increase because the wages for non-degreed individuals have completely plummeted in almost all fields. You can still find a few where the unions are strong, but even there most of those jobs are seeing increasing global competition and many more will fall over the next few decades.


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## xisnotx (Mar 20, 2014)

In America..."By 27 years of age, 32 percent of women had received a bachelor's degree, compared with 24 percent of men."

According to a source...

So, really...it may not be "needed". It's just an asset. 

(Or in my case...it was something to do, as I was bored...)


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## AriesLilith (Jan 6, 2013)

xisnotx said:


> In America..."By 27 years of age, 32 percent of women had received a bachelor's degree, compared with 24 percent of men."
> 
> According to a source...
> 
> ...


This is a bit too simplistic to assume that a degree is not really needed. Sure, only 1/3 ~ 1/4 population has a degree so we probably don't need one to survive, but then a big number of jobs are just average to low, and how many people has higher quality of life? Of course, this is also debatable, as it depends on the demands of each field (employers), what field you want to work at, as well as luck/intelligence to maybe succeed at your own business.

So this logic is not enough for determining the value of a degree in terms of career success. The relevant questions to determine the value of a degree are:
- what do you want for your career/jobs?
- how is the market demand (employers) for this degree in the country where you want to live?

For example, where I live, for technical people in the IT field (programmerd, developers, admins and so on), maybe 10 years ago experienced people would still be more valued. But now most companies are asking for people with a degree, and those who don't have one might be much less paid just coz they don't have a degree and even if they are experienced (unless you work with some rare technology with lack of professionals in the market), or not even hired.
On the other hand, there are some degrees that won't even get you a job here so it's worthless to get one.

That is why to understand the worth of a certain degree, you need to analyze those two questions and other potentially relevant points.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

AriesLilith said:


> For example, where I live, for technical people in the IT field (programmerd, developers, admins and so on), maybe 10 years ago experienced people would still be more valued. But now most companies are asking for people with a degree, and those who don't have one might be much less paid just coz they don't have a degree and even if they are experienced (unless you work with some rare technology with lack of professionals in the market), or not even hired.


Then the IT employers where you live are misguided. Look at how hiring is done at Google, one of the most successful IT companies in the world which receives thousands of job applications on a regular basis:



> Google famously used to ask everyone for a transcript and G.P.A.’s and test scores, but we don’t anymore, unless you’re just a few years out of school. *We found that they don’t predict anything.*
> 
> What’s interesting is the proportion of people without any college education at Google has increased over time as well. So we have teams where you have 14 percent of the team made up of people who’ve never gone to college.





> I think academic environments are artificial environments. People who succeed there are sort of finely trained, they’re conditioned to succeed in that environment. One of my own frustrations when I was in college and grad school is that you knew the professor was looking for a specific answer. You could figure that out, but it’s much more interesting to solve problems where there isn’t an obvious answer. *You want people who like figuring out stuff where there is no obvious answer.*





> When you look at people who don’t go to school and make their way in the world, those are exceptional human beings. And we should do everything we can to find those people.





> For every job, though, the No. 1 thing we look for is general cognitive ability, and it’s not IQ. It’s learning ability. *It’s the ability to process on the fly. It’s the ability to pull together disparate bits of information.* We assess that using structured behavioral interviews that we validate to make sure they’re predictive.


How Google hires people - Business Insider

How to Get a Job at Google - NYTimes.com

In the IT field in particular, the trend is going in the opposite direction than you described. What is needed are people with the ability to keep up with new and changing technologies, not to mention create their own. The traditional education model is simply not designed to support this, and degrees are practically worthless as a search filter for locating people who can actually do the job.



> *A surprisingly large fraction of applicants, even those with masters' degrees and PhDs in computer science, fail during interviews when asked to carry out basic programming tasks.* For example, I've personally interviewed graduates who can't answer "Write a loop that counts from 1 to 10" or "What's the number after F in hexadecimal?" Less trivially, I've interviewed many candidates who can't use recursion to solve a real problem. These are basic skills; anyone who lacks them probably hasn't done much programming.
> 
> Speaking on behalf of software engineers who have to interview prospective new hires, I can safely say that we're tired of talking to candidates who can't program their way out of a paper bag. If you can successfully write a loop that goes from 1 to 10 in every language on your resume, can do simple arithmetic without a calculator, and can use recursion to solve a real problem, you're already ahead of the pack!


How To Get Hired -- What CS Students Need to Know


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## AriesLilith (Jan 6, 2013)

@pernoctator, it would be nice if diplomas are not that relevant, but tell that to the companies of my country and some companies in other countries of Europe (googled some position ads in the past although not enough to make a more solid assumption, although some of them even asks for masters degree). 

As for graduates who can't even write a loop... Honestly it sounds like some universities are not doing a good job preparing their students. I've read about this somewhere before, that there are people who can't even write a loop, but have never seen or heard this around me in the real life. In my university it is basically one of the first basics we learn.
Actually the most interesting interviews I had involved some programming even with recursivity and a bit of challenge. Graduates are expected to know the basics, while experienced people are expected to know application architechtures and answering questions about common issues in a real environment and possible ways to debug and solve things.
Also, it's true that the course might only provide an artificial environment, but it's supposed to provide the basics which is acknowledged as standard knowledge, so that the employers can know that the graduates have them. If you can pass all the exams and expectations of a course from a well acknowledged university then you are supposed to know the basics that you are supposed to learn before even starting to work. They can give you a technical test or ask technical questions during an interview, but they can't cover every knowledge learned from the course of course.
Although this is more about differenciating graduates from non graduates in which both have no experience. I disagree with how experienced professionals are less valued compared to fresh graduates, coz for what is worth, if someone has years of experience then what more proof do we need to see that this guy can handle the job? :/ Unfortunately, in my country, it seems that employers try to pay less to professionals without diplomas with the lousy excuse that they don't have diplomas. My husband is a very experienced and capable professional, and yet has worse possibilities than me just coz he lacks a diploma. We talked about emmigrating to other countries in Europe, unfortunately many ads asks for a diploma which is a big disadvantage for him.
(although of course, education here is affordable and you don't end up with debts so this is probably one of the reasons why expectations might differ compared to US).


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

AriesLilith said:


> Also, it's true that the course might only provide an artificial environment, but it's supposed to provide the basics which is acknowledged as standard knowledge, so that the employers can know that the graduates have them. If you can pass all the exams and expectations of a course from a well acknowledged university then you are supposed to know the basics that you are supposed to learn before even starting to work.


Yes, but the point is these suppositions are false or at least very unreliable. Of course they do teach students how to do basic things like write a loop in American schools too, but that doesn't mean they are going to be able to remember it after graduation, or even know how to look up the information they've forgotten, or most importantly, how to apply the knowledge to other scenarios creatively.

Students may know how to succeed in an academic environment; that is, memorizing "correct" solutions to formulaic problems. But developing the skills of the modern information age -- adaptability, innovation, gathering and applying diverse information -- is completely at odds with the syllabus-following, note-taking, standardized-testing university world. Some professors and students may break the mold and get more out of it, but the diploma and test scores don't reflect that whatsoever. It's better to focus on questions like "what have you done" and "how would you solve this problem". It doesn't take long to discover whether someone knows the basics, whether they have the credentials or not.



AriesLilith said:


> Unfortunately, in my country, it seems that employers try to pay less to professionals without diplomas with the lousy excuse that they don't have diplomas. My husband is a very experienced and capable professional, and yet has worse possibilities than me just coz he lacks a diploma. We talked about emmigrating to other countries in Europe, unfortunately many ads asks for a diploma which is a big disadvantage for him.


I didn't mean the problem is solved in other countries. I just didn't agree with what you said about more companies focusing on degrees now than 10 years ago. Overall, degrees have been losing the value they had in the past. I wouldn't write off your whole country based on your experience so far.


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## AriesLilith (Jan 6, 2013)

pernoctator said:


> Yes, but the point is these suppositions are false or at least very unreliable. Of course they do teach students how to do basic things like write a loop in American schools too, but that doesn't mean they are going to be able to remember it after graduation, or even know how to look up the information they've forgotten, or most importantly, how to apply the knowledge to other scenarios creatively.
> 
> Students may know how to succeed in an academic environment; that is, memorizing "correct" solutions to formulaic problems. But developing the skills of the modern information age -- adaptability, innovation, gathering and applying diverse information -- is completely at odds with the syllabus-following, note-taking, standardized-testing university world. Some professors and students may break the mold and get more out of it, but the diploma and test scores don't reflect that whatsoever. It's better to focus on questions like "what have you done" and "how would you solve this problem". It doesn't take long to discover whether someone knows the basics, whether they have the credentials or not.
> 
> ...


Honestly I can't really imagine any graduate forgetting how a loop/cycle is like when they finish the classes lol. What might be more possible to forget are the exact syntaxes of a programming language for example, or any theory or pretty definitions/terms.
Although university exams are often not only about memorizing things, unlike high school ones, at least the ones I did. We had to do some thinking and analysis too when it comes to theoretical knowledge. As for practice we also had projects through the semesters in which we write applications and databases, as well as other things, that while they are not even close to the complex enterprise applications that works in real life environments processing great volume of information, they are still the basics which gets things started.

A course might still not be compared to experience of course, although it can be used to differenciate people who had no previous experience (if two guys doesn't have experience then at least a diploma can show stronger possibility that the diploma holder has the basics of programming and IT - again, depending on the uni's quality).

I would also disagree with the logic of degree strictly > than experience, unfortunately it became a big deal filter here and in some other countries around, at least for this field. The loss of its value is rather more like everyone is going to have them now so that it won't grant you jobs like it used to, yet if you don't have it your chances are even more reduced here.


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## SugarForBreakfast (Jun 25, 2012)

Razare said:


> In my job-hunt, I saw many accounting related jobs that did not require a degree, which paid 12 to 15 an hour.


Well, now I want to know more!


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## Razare (Apr 21, 2009)

SugarForBreakfast said:


> Well, now I want to know more!


A/R Clerk: Accounts Receivable Clerk Jobs in Southfield, Michigan - Accountemps

Payroll Clerk (Hard to get w/o experience): Payroll Clerk Jobs in Byron Center, Michigan - Accountemps

Accounting Clerk: Accounting Clerk Jobs in Southfield, Michigan - Accountemps

Accounting Assistant: Accounting Assistant Jobs in Grand Rapids, Michigan - Accountemps

This is just from the first couple of pages from a 16 page search I pulled up on careerbuilder. Just do a search for your state, and plug-in as criteria in advanced search that you want to search inside the accounting industry. That's the only filter I used. I didn't search "accounting clerk" or anything, but you could try that.

These jobs that pay around 12-15 are almost always clerk jobs. This means it usually involves repetitive data entry.

The accounting assistant job I found is actually a pretty good job for not requiring a degree. It involves enough different things that it would not be that repetitive.

Anyway, you'd want to search your state. A -lot- of these accounting jobs will be posted through Accounttemps and Robert Half. These are the people who landed me my job, so they are legit. Also try searching on Job Search | one search. all jobs. Indeed.com where you'll find more postings directly from companies.


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## Gossip Goat (Nov 19, 2013)

I read that when hiring employees (in some careers) they don't look at your education, they look if you're experience. But if you are a student looking for internships you need the education so you atleast know what's required.


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## PowerShell (Feb 3, 2013)

Supply and demand. There's more college graduates (especially with no-skill worthless degrees). Employers will usually hire the more qualified (degreed) candidates over non-degreed candidates.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

Degrees are needed because there is a demand for degrees.

Get it? No, I should probably explain that better.

It's not that all or even most jobs out there which require college degrees actually require a degree to do the actual work. It's that a great number of people have a degree and want those good jobs and so having or not have a degree is a simple way to thin the heard of prospective applicants. That's really the long and short of it in a great number of cases. Not all, but a large number.

It's an extra hoop to jump through. Jumping through the hoop may not actually be useful or demonstrate anything in particular, but everyone else is jumping through that hope and the boss is only considering people who jump through. So you better jump through.


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## William I am (May 20, 2011)

dark_angel said:


> Good paying jobs require a college degree. Some call it the new high school diploma. Before, one could get by as middle class on one income and all that's required is high school. Now even college grads are having trouble finding decent work. What happens to those with school phobia who is glad just to finish high school and go straight to work? How do ppl support themselves on $10 an hour? Fuck school. This isn't fair.


You're assuming that a college degree is a requirement. This is basically propaganda. There are lots of semi-skilled jobs that you can train for and get into within a year that pay around $20 an hour, if not more.

The bigger issue is that valuable jobs are not accessible to most people. Even a college degree doesn't guarantee anything. I have a BA in applied math and worked as a mechanic for 2 weeks (got fired), a barback/glorified dishwasher for 5 months, and now I'm delivering appliances for $12 an hour - and that's the best I've been paid in 5 years (except when I worked for this same employer 2 years ago).


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

PowerShell said:


> Supply and demand. There's more college graduates (especially with no-skill worthless degrees). Employers will usually hire the more qualified (degreed) candidates over non-degreed candidates.


This is backwards. The proliferation of degrees has made them less significant, not more. 




Sourpuss said:


> and the boss is only considering people who jump through.


Not true. Sometimes it is, yes. But this is terrible reasoning from a cost-benefit perspective. The convenience of not being weeded out by lazy employers when there are high volumes of applicants does not remotely outweigh the time, effort, money, and psychological stress of jumping through.


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## AriesLilith (Jan 6, 2013)

The problem with arguing about this is that the value of a degree highly depends on the country and job field we are talking about. For example, here in my country it IS a requirement in most if not all job applications for IT (programmers, analysts, administrators and so on). And even if some companies do hire a professional without a degree, they then justify the (much) low wage they are willing to pay for them with their lack of degree. My husband is a very good sys admin with 10+ year exp and he is having a quite hard time to find another job. I've talked to my connections within the field and some who knows RH people have confirmed that without a degree, is will continue to have little chance to get hired and if he would never earn much (if he had a degree now he might even be able to earn double).

But here getting a degree isn't as hard as in America, you can basically pay your student fees with part time or even less than 3 months of boring full time jobs during summer. A yearly fee is around 1000€. So only people with difficulty in studies can't achieve a degree (my husband sucks at maths); and then there has been more and more graduates in computer science.

Perhaps if a country has few people with degree then the companies wouldn't make a degree a requirement, but it really depends on the country and the field we are talking about.


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## Uralian Hamster (May 13, 2011)

A degree is needed because it is. Because, the economy and...stuff. Also the jobs will be mediocre and people will laugh at you. 

A degree is overkill for most positions, quite a few jobs that can be had with a bachelor's degree can be obtained just as well with an associates or diploma. A lot of students don't even know why they go to university, besides being the thing to do.


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## Dynamitetalks (Sep 21, 2012)

bollocks said:


> A lot of students don't even know why they go to university, besides being the thing to do.


Im starting at the university soon, but its only my plan B, plan A is to be an entrepreneur or freelance animator. for the past 6 month I have spent all my free time learning software programs. But other than a plan B, university for me is also for networking and ressources.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> The convenience of not being weeded out by lazy employers when there are high volumes of applicants does not remotely outweigh the time, effort, money, and psychological stress of jumping through.


It does if you don't want to be a wage slave for your entire life. That is no less stressful or costly in the long run.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

Sourpuss said:


> It does if you don't want to be a wage slave for your entire life. That is no less stressful or costly in the long run.


Wrong. You're parroting propaganda. Sorry to tell you, but we're all in the same boat. Attending university is not going to magically exempt you from the danger of becoming a wage slave. Your assertion that "the boss is only considering degree holders" is absolutely false. Will it take a non-graduate longer to get accepted to an interview and be considered for a high paying job matching their skill? Maybe. Will that be longer than it takes to complete a degree and pay off the debt? Very likely not. The degree path is the greater gamble.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> Wrong. You're parroting propaganda. Sorry to tell you, but we're all in the same boat. Attending university is not going to magically exempt you from the danger of becoming a wage slave.


Who said anything about magic? Nothing is guaranteed, but you are more likely to be employed and more likely to live above the poverty line if you have a degree.

Without one you have much less of a chance to make enough money to have real disposable income. That entails a whole host of problems. It means living in worse areas, having much less vacation time, less happiness, and later retirement, and less probability of even being able to afford retirement.

Not to mention you are more likely to be reliant on welfare.


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## PowerShell (Feb 3, 2013)

pernoctator said:


> This is backwards. The proliferation of degrees has made them less significant, not more.


No it has made the premium they have over not having a degree less since more people have degrees (supply and demand).


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

Sourpuss said:


> Who said anything about magic? Nothing is guaranteed, but you are more likely to be employed and more likely to live above the poverty line if you have a degree.
> 
> Without one you have much less of a chance to make enough money to have real disposable income. That entails a whole host of problems. It means living in worse areas, having much less vacation time, less happiness, and later retirement, and less probability of even being able to afford retirement.
> 
> Not to mention you are more likely to be reliant on welfare.


First, I didn't say anything about guarantees. I said "not exempt from the danger", i.e. you are not considerably safer; and "the degree path is the greater gamble", i.e. you stand to take a loss either way, but pursuing a degree is higher risk. Also, statistics involving poverty are bound to mislead to correlation-causation errors because there are almost always external factors that would have affected both their ability to attend school and to get a good job.

Now I speak from experience, and my situation is not unique: I don't have a rich family, or exceptional luck, or friends in high places, and I'm not some genius entrepreneur. I have never attended university, and I'm employed in a highly skilled job, have real disposable income, and paid vacation. Everything you say above is propaganda -- at worst, complete bullshit, and at best, advice that was once valid and is now outdated by decades.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> Now I speak from experience, and my situation is not unique. I don't have a rich family, or exceptional luck, or friends in high places, and I'm not some genius entrepreneur. I have never attended university, and I'm employed in a highly skilled job, have real disposable income, and paid vacation. Everything you say above is propaganda -- at worst, complete bullshit, and at best, advice that was once valid and is now outdated by decades.


Exceptions do not make the rule.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

PowerShell said:


> No it has made the premium they have over not having a degree less since more people have degrees (supply and demand).


Your market analogy may be a nice way to answer the question of the thread, but is irrelevant since the premise of the question is false.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

Sourpuss said:


> Exceptions do not make the rule.


Wonderful job, but you've ignored the majority of my post and missed the point. Try again.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> Wonderful job, but you've ignored the majority of my post and missed the point. Try again.


I read your entire post but I'm not sure what your point is. I never said a degree guaranteed anything or that there was no risk. No degree might be safer in the sense that you are more likely to avoid massive debt, but it also has far fewer prospects.

You beat the odds. Good for you. You and I come from similar backgrounds but it hasn't worked for me like it did for you. I wasn't able to get my foot in the door with regards to skilled labor. So I work full time and get 1 week paid vacation a year. I don't make enough to do much other than work. Certainly not enough to put anything away for retirement. I am lucky enough though to work for a very small company that provides excellent health coverage.

If I ever want something better in life, as in a nicer place to live, more vacation time, they money to actual GO SOMEWHERE for vacation, and more importantly the money to save for retirement, then I'm going to need a degree. Soon too, since I'm nearing 30.

Having a degree is a great boon. It is not a guarantee and it will still mean working hard and long for a while, but it has a pay-off if you are willing to keep a level head. You can pay off your debt and when you do you'll have way more income than most non-degree holders.

Again, I stress, you beat the odds. You do not represent the majority of non-degree holders who on average make quite a bit less and are at a great risk of being unemployed.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

Sourpuss said:


> I read your entire post but I'm not sure what your point is. I never said a degree guaranteed anything or that there was no risk. No degree might be safer in the sense that you are more likely to avoid massive debt, but it also has far fewer prospects.
> 
> You beat the odds. Good for you. You and I come from similar backgrounds but it hasn't worked for me like it did for you. I wasn't able to get my foot in the door with regards to skilled labor. So I work full time and get 1 week paid vacation a year. I don't make enough to do much other than work. Certainly not enough to put anything away for retirement. I am lucky enough though to work for a very small company that provides excellent health coverage.
> 
> ...


Thank you for confirming that you missed the point. Let me try and clarify.

Yes, you could say I beat the odds. But guess what? A degree-holder in my position _also would have beaten the odds_. If you'd gotten a degree, you'd probably still be telling me the same story right now. As I said, my situation is not unique -- that is, not any more so than it is for anyone with a degree. The point is that most people in my position didn't have to do anything extraordinary to compensate for the fact that they don't have a degree -- they just may have had to wait a little longer to be considered. Again, we are all in the same boat. The only significant difference is the debt. For your sake, do not buy into the propaganda.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> Yes, you could say I beat the odds. But guess what? A degree-holder in my position _also would have beaten the odds_.


He has fewer odds to beat in the first place and much more to gain. What about this don't you understand?


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

Sourpuss said:


> He has fewer odds to beat in the first place and much more to gain. What about this don't you understand?


I understand the concept perfectly. My problem with it is the fact that it's untrue.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> I understand the concept perfectly. My problem with it is the fact that it's untrue.


Census Stats Show Degree Holders Less Likely to Be Unemployed - National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators

The statistics say otherwise.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

Sourpuss said:


> Census Stats Show Degree Holders Less Likely to Be Unemployed - National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators
> 
> The statistics say otherwise.


Not surprising. Remember that most people who are capable of affording school are taking it by default, under the assumption that they need to. The same group of people also happen to have reasonable chances of being employed, with or without the degree. It's basically a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It seems this part is what you're failing to understand:



> my situation is not unique -- that is, not any more so than it is for anyone with a degree


My situation = being skilled and having the right job market available, basically. Now where in your census is this taken into consideration? I'd warned you earlier about reading too much into statistics. The argument that you should get a degree based on this is akin to this argument:

_"There are more people who are well fed among those who drive cars than those who don't, therefore you must get a driver's license or you will likely starve."_

Although it's technically true from a global statistical perspective that any given person who drives is more likely to be eating well, this shouldn't be a factor in the decision to use a car to a person living in a developed country with a reasonable income. They can just go eat. Likewise, anyone who is capable of doing a job should pursue it, regardless of whether they have the badge... especially when getting it would occupy at least the next few years and likely keep them in debt for several more to come.


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## Glory (Sep 28, 2013)

we all gon die, we bleed through similar veins; pleasure n pain we all stuck in this game


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## Scrabbletray (Apr 27, 2014)

@pernoctator

The reason that being able to drive a car correlates to being well fed is because they are both a function of money. This is somewhat true with the correlation between high paying jobs and education, but there is also an obvious causal relationship whereby a good education makes a person more likely to get a good job. The statistics are glaringly obvious in this case and your personal situation doesn't change that fact.


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## Sourpuss (Aug 9, 2014)

You do not need to be rich to get a degree. Ever hear of financial assistance? That's where all the student debt comes from. The well off folks don't have that debt because they or their parents paid for it all out of pocket.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

a1b2c3d4 said:


> @pernoctator
> 
> The reason that being able to drive a car correlates to being well fed is because they are both a function of money. This is somewhat true with the correlation between high paying jobs and education, but there is also an obvious causal relationship whereby a good education makes a person more likely to get a good job. The statistics are glaringly obvious in this case and your personal situation doesn't change that fact.


I never said the reasons were the same in both arguments, so I don't know why you're pointing that out. Money itself is usually another side-effect of other factors, not the direct cause. I'll agree that that statement is obvious, but the problem is that your definition of "education" is too narrow. The statistics are not glaringly obvious indications of any such thing, because they aren't filtered to otherwise viable candidates. Obviously you've missed the point of my analogy. My personal situation is not rare when properly compared to other skilled prospective employees with or without degrees.


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## Scrabbletray (Apr 27, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> Obviously you've missed the point of my analogy. My personal situation is not rare when properly compared to other skilled prospective employees with or without degrees.


You keep saying people must have missed the point of your analogy when clearly they understand it and are simply disagreeing with you. As for "skills", that's the whole point of going to college. Obviously if someone has acquired the same skills on their own that they could have learned in college then that's great and they can get a job, but that's a far harder and rarer path than simply going to college to learn a certain profession. What skills do you have that you learned outside of college which allow you to be very successful without a college education? Obviously there are plenty of cases, but there are plenty more cases where you could never get a certain job without a college education. I'm an electrical engineer for instance and that's not something you can ever just learn by having street smarts.


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## William I am (May 20, 2011)

Actually, that is a recent development. A lot of people who started in the engineering field 40 years ago don't have a degree - electrical engineering among them. 

Can we agree to this - Having a degree makes you more likely to get a job/interview for higher end jobs, but whether or not you have access to or knowledge of those jobs is a bigger determining factor in what job you actually wind up with. 
Most of the people I grew up around were farm laborers or dairymen or construction workers or mechanics or truck drivers - basically no professionals other than my parents. 

My main difficulty is that I don't even know the first thing about trying to get a professional level job. I've been thinking recently a lot about castes in the US (we call them classes and somehow that's so much more acceptable than castes). It's the exception for anyone to leave the caste they were born into. If your parents spent any time with you homeless, your odds of being homeless at some point in your life (living on the street or in a car) are something like triple the average population's chances.
The same thing goes for the jobs your peers, parents, and role models have. If you spent time in professional offices or shadowed someone at work or got an internship at your dad's friend's business, you're much more likely to be able to find that type of job.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

a1b2c3d4 said:


> You keep saying people must have missed the point of your analogy when clearly they understand it and are simply disagreeing with you.


What are you talking about? You are the only person so far who responded to the analogy since I made it, and I only said it once. If you didn't misunderstand it, then you should have known that your reply was irrelevant before you posted it. 



a1b2c3d4 said:


> As for "skills", that's the whole point of going to college. Obviously if someone has acquired the same skills on their own that they could have learned in college then that's great and they can get a job, but that's a far harder and rarer path than simply going to college to learn a certain profession. What skills do you have that you learned outside of college which allow you to be very successful without a college education? Obviously there are plenty of cases, but there are plenty more cases where you could never get a certain job without a college education. I'm an electrical engineer for instance and that's not something you can ever just learn by having street smarts.


I would personally argue that college is obsolete for _any_ skill (and the reason that this is rare is usually more to do with the ingrained value placed on college than it actually being "harder")... and yes, that includes electrical engineering (it's not even that rare), but I think this is actually besides the point in this particular thread. This thread is around the notion that you need a degree, period, to be well off -- highly skilled or otherwise. This is simply untrue, and believing it is causing more harm than good overall.


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## Transvaler (Jun 15, 2014)

In a 3rd world country a degree is very important. You have so many other people looking for jobs so the skilled and unskilled have to be filtered out.

In South Africa there's a policy called "Black Economic Empowerment". Basically it regulates the black vs white ratio there has to be in a company or government. For instance, if there are 10 white people and 2 black guys in a company, BEE may require the company to add 8 black employees, but then the company has to fire 8 white employees. It happens on all levels and we've especially lost a lot of expert engineers, electricians, government officials and doctors.  Unfortunately BEE does not consider the skill level of a black person so the quality of many BEE driven companies have dropped significantly. Race-driven politics is far from economical.

Now what this means to me as a white African is I need to get the highest possible qualification so that 1) I can get a job in South Africa or 2)that I can emigrate and offer my services in some other country. BEE seemed like a good idea 20 years ago, but the policy is timeless with no reflection. Unfortunately, black student drop-out rates are proportionally higher, if not doubled, in universities. So the country is busy losing its skilled citizens. Ironically though, hundreds of Cubans are invited to work here as doctors...and they're taking black people's place.


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## Scrabbletray (Apr 27, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> I would personally argue that college is obsolete for _any_ skill (and the reason that this is rare is usually more to do with the ingrained value placed on college than it actually being "harder")... and yes, that includes electrical engineering (it's not even that rare), but I think this is actually besides the point in this particular thread. This thread is around the notion that you need a degree, period, to be well off -- highly skilled or otherwise. This is simply untrue, and believing it is causing more harm than good overall.


Where do you expect someone to just learn engineering out of the blue? Yes, you could theoretically read all of the textbooks and do all of the problem sets yourself, but without a degree nobody is going to believe you when you say you did these things (not to mention it would be much more difficult without professors to help you learn). Nobody has tried to argue that it is completely impossible for even a single person without a degree to have a good job. You can keep attacking that strawman all you want, but it's pointless. What people are arguing is that the odds are stacked against a person without a degree and if you want to prove them wrong then come up with something more than just your own individual success.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

a1b2c3d4 said:


> Where do you expect someone to just learn engineering out of the blue? Yes, you could theoretically read all of the textbooks and do all of the problem sets yourself, but without a degree nobody is going to believe you when you say you did these things (not to mention it would be much more difficult without professors to help you learn).


As someone said earlier in the thread: "Yesterday's economy was all about what you know. Today's economy is all about what you can do." Again, your line of reasoning is outdated propaganda. Nobody is going to believe the degree holder either unless he can prove he actually knows what he's doing as opposed to being able to pass tests once upon a time. Your view of "street smarts" / "out of the blue" versus "college" is a false dichotomy.



a1b2c3d4 said:


> Nobody has tried to argue that it is completely impossible for even a single person without a degree to have a good job. You can keep attacking that strawman all you want, but it's pointless. What people are arguing is that the odds are stacked against a person without a degree and if you want to prove them wrong then come up with something more than just your own individual success.


Your claim of strawman-attacking is, itself, a strawman attack. First, I don't know where you and Sourpuss are getting these absolutes like "guarantees" and "completely impossible" from. It certainly was nowhere in any of my posts. Second, I only recently mentioned, in passing, my own individual success, and it is hardly the core of my argument (for a long time I was personally in the same unfortunate position, but I was still equally aware of the reality I'm now discussing -- it's why I never attended in the first place). It ought to have been pretty clear that we're talking about individual cost-benefit prospects and what employers in general look for nowadays. Feel free to re-read the whole thread if you missed that. The statistics you cite are inapplicable to this.


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## HFGE (Jul 19, 2014)

@_pernoctator_ - I think recent trends indicate that the users arguing with you are still correct and that you're still in the minority when it comes to degree holders vs non-degree holders and income/job quality.

The Rising Cost of Not Going to College | Pew Research Center's Social & Demographic Trends Project

Also, considering that most work is orders of magnitude more complicated today than it was fifty years ago kind of necessitates that all skilled non-trade jobs require a degree of some sort. That's considered the most basic of candidate filters and that hasn't changed at all. Heck, even most people entering skilled trades go to post-secondary school for a degree. So it seems everyone is becoming more educated these days!


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## PowerShell (Feb 3, 2013)

pernoctator said:


> Today's economy is all about what you can do.


What you can do? Like fulfill all the requirements required to get a degree? Unless you are staking it out on your own and make your own products and sell them, you will be filtered out on what you can do based on the degree since you need to do certain things and ultimately can do them in order to obtain the degree.


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## William I am (May 20, 2011)

Can we end this debate about whether or not a college degree is valuable right now?

http://www.census.gov/prod/2012pubs/acsbr11-04.pdf

Obviously, and with hard science to back it up, a degree opens more doors than it closes. Nothing is guaranteed by a degree, and that is a major problem for some people.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

HFGE said:


> @_pernoctator_ - I think recent trends indicate that the users arguing with you are still correct and that you're still in the minority when it comes to degree holders vs non-degree holders and income/job quality.
> 
> The Rising Cost of Not Going to College | Pew Research Center's Social & Demographic Trends Project
> 
> Also, considering that most work is orders of magnitude more complicated today than it was fifty years ago kind of necessitates that all skilled non-trade jobs require a degree of some sort. That's considered the most basic of candidate filters and that hasn't changed at all. Heck, even most people entering skilled trades go to post-secondary school for a degree. So it seems everyone is becoming more educated these days!


You're bringing nothing new to the table for me, I'm afraid. If you read everything I've said, you'll notice that I've already addressed both the statistical correlation between highly paid skilled work and college degrees, and the fact that the nature of work has changed over time. All of your information is correct, but your conclusions aren't. In short: 1) As the degree's popularity has skyrocketed, there is an almost 1-to-1 correlation between drive to achieve and pursuit of a degree, and we lose sight of the fact that the degree may not have been necessary for the achievement. 2) Today's highly technical work calls much more for experience and practically demonstrable skill, such that this "basic filter" is now all but meaningless and not enforced nearly as much as it once was. This actually goes back to 1 also, as employers are realizing how watered down the college crowd has become, and applies to less skilled jobs as well.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

PowerShell said:


> What you can do? Like fulfill all the requirements required to get a degree?


Naturally -- but as the spectrum of what qualifies as fulfilling those requirements widens, the meaningfulness of the degree itself drops. Hence, employers would rather see more tangible evidence of what was actually done.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

William I am said:


> Can we end this debate about whether or not a college degree is valuable right now?
> 
> http://www.census.gov/prod/2012pubs/acsbr11-04.pdf
> 
> Obviously, and with hard science to back it up, a degree opens more doors than it closes. Nothing is guaranteed by a degree, and that is a major problem for some people.


Yes, the fact that it adds value is obvious. The problem is the widespread automatic assumption that it's a worthwhile investment, which can be very dangerous.


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## HFGE (Jul 19, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> You're bringing nothing new to the table for me, I'm afraid. If you read everything I've said, you'll notice that I've already addressed both the statistical correlation between highly paid skilled work and college degrees, and the fact that the nature of work has changed over time. All of your information is correct, but your conclusions aren't. In short: 1) As the degree's popularity has skyrocketed, there is an almost 1-to-1 correlation between drive to achieve and pursuit of a degree, and we lose sight of the fact that the degree may not have been necessary for the achievement. 2) Today's highly technical work calls much more for experience and practically demonstrable skill, such that this "basic filter" is now all but meaningless and not enforced nearly as much as it once was. This actually goes back to 1 also, as employers are realizing how watered down the college crowd has become, and applies to less skilled jobs as well.


There are a few technical jobs out there that don't require a degree but having a degree certainly helps. For instance, GE frequently hires technicians who may or may not have a degree. For people with a bachelor's in a STEM degree, they're entry level positions and for people without a degree it's considered a very experienced (anywhere from 4-12 years exp) position. So trading four years of your life to attend college to be eligible for positions that normally require ~8 yrs of experience with no degree seems like a good trade off to me.

I guess it really depends on how you started off your career though. I've met more than a few people who started off as machinists and went back to school to become drafters or engineers. Or the company they work for sent them back to school to obtain a degree so that they could be eligible for a promotion or pay raise. In those cases a degree is symbolic of your commitment to personal growth and development and at the very least shows that you at have a solid work ethic and know how to learn abstract subjects. So if you think about it that way, a degree only helps you sustain success with your career.


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## tanstaafl28 (Sep 10, 2012)

dark_angel said:


> Good paying jobs require a college degree. Some call it the new high school diploma. Before, one could get by as middle class on one income and all that's required is high school. Now even college grads are having trouble finding decent work. What happens to those with school phobia who is glad just to finish high school and go straight to work? How do ppl support themselves on $10 an hour? Fuck school. This isn't fair.


Go into the military. 

As for why degrees are required, it's a measure of just how much bullshit you're willing to put up with in order to get one. Employers know they're going to make you put up with a lot of bullshit, so they want only the ones with a high tolerance for it.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

HFGE said:


> So trading four years of your life to attend college to be eligible for positions that normally require ~8 yrs of experience with no degree seems like a good trade off to me.


You're assuming that 4 years of college plus 4 years of experience is worth more than 8 years of solid experience. Remember that experience can be graded and existence of a degree can't. You're also not including the risk of the financial investment, especially considering the very real possibility that you'll never land that GE job either way.


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## HFGE (Jul 19, 2014)

pernoctator said:


> You're assuming that 4 years of college plus 4 years of experience is worth more than 8 years of solid experience. Remember that experience can be graded and existence of a degree can't. You're also not including the risk of the financial investment, especially considering the very real possibility that you'll never land that GE job either way.


I'm not making any assumptions. In terms of time spent compared to how much time a degree is worth, it's more efficient to acquire a degree and start off at a minimum level versus forging the degree and starting off acquiring the experience to reach that minimum level. I was simply using typical manufacturing positions at GE as a real-world example of how a degree can be worthwhile in the work world.

As for the financial burden, yes you are entering the job market already in debt but there are ways to mitigate that.  You can start a savings fund to help pay for your schooling, receive tuition benefits from your work, if you're an older person you can apply as an independent applicant and receive many more scholarship and grant opportunities. There are many ways to receive assistance these days, especially because most employers want their employees to have received some form of post-high school education.

In the US, going to college isn't for everyone but for a person to say they can't afford it shouldn't be a legitimate reason.


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## pernoctator (May 1, 2012)

HFGE said:


> I'm not making any assumptions. In terms of time spent compared to *how much time a degree is worth*, it's more efficient to acquire a degree and start off at a minimum level versus forging the degree and starting off acquiring the experience to reach that minimum level. I was simply using typical manufacturing positions at GE as a real-world example of how a degree can be worthwhile in the work world.


You are making an assumption, in bold above: that "years spent" are all created equal. A degree isn't "worth" 4 years; it depends what you did during that time.



HFGE said:


> In the US, going to college isn't for everyone but for a person to say they can't afford it shouldn't be a legitimate reason.


Of course, I know that. But notice I was talking about "investment", not "funding".


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## PowerShell (Feb 3, 2013)

pernoctator said:


> Naturally -- but as the spectrum of what qualifies as fulfilling those requirements widens, the meaningfulness of the degree itself drops. Hence, employers would rather see more tangible evidence of what was actually done.


Sure when you actually have experience under your belt, that is more important than a degree. The thing is, at entry-level, the only real thing to prove yourself is a degree or some sort of other accepted credentials. Anyone can say they're going to do a good job but how do you take their word for it?


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## chanteuse (May 30, 2014)

If you have the temperament to be in a work place for 25, 30 years, public sector job is a good bet. White collar public sector jobs need college degree or higher. Also, the bigger the municipality, the better the security (small cities do let workers go and the pesion can be peanuts). The trade off is: 1. bureaucray (dealing with a lot of Si/Se types); 2. lack of upward mobility, and 3. money (enough to live an independent life but not to get rich).

Again, you have to have the temperament to stick around if you have the ant mentality.


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## Apolo (Aug 15, 2014)

chanteuse said:


> If you have the temperament to be in a work place for 25, 30 years, public sector job is a good bet. White collar public sector jobs need college degree or higher. Also, the bigger the municipality, the better the security (small cities do let workers go and the pesion can be peanuts). The trade off is: 1. bureaucray (dealing with a lot of Si/Se types); 2. lack of upward mobility, and 3. money (enough to live an independent life but not to get rich).
> 
> Again, you have to have the temperament to stick around if you have the ant mentality.


Is it even possible for an ISTP to do this? Lol, I can't imagine it is.


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## Acadia (Mar 20, 2014)

Man, I have no idea. I just graduated with a dual major in environmental studies and jounalism with a minor in animal behavior, ecology & conservation science. I'm okay with wandering [just moved cross-country for a summer job, hopping back home for a few months, and then possibly making another big move] but I would like to know it has a purpose. I'm a wildlife rehabilitator, and I'm considering pursuing my two-year certification to be a vet tech. I feel like it could help in terms of getting a permanent position somewhere. I don't want to feel stuck, either. Ick. I get all messed up about this stuff


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## Apolo (Aug 15, 2014)

heartofpompeii said:


> I don't want to feel stuck, either. Ick. I get all messed up about this stuff


That is exactly how I feel about potential jobs...


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## chanteuse (May 30, 2014)

Apolo said:


> Is it even possible for an ISTP to do this? Lol, I can't imagine it is.


One of my best friends at work is an ISTP. He struggled for 5 years, could not stand it. Finally after a promotion and reaching 42, he embraces the job and will stay until he can retire.

Age and amount of work (for the pay) play a big part.


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## Apolo (Aug 15, 2014)

chanteuse said:


> One of my best friends at work is an ISTP. He struggled for 5 years, could not stand it. Finally after a promotion and reaching 42, he embraces the job and will stay until he can retire.
> 
> Age and amount of work (for the pay) play a big part.


Hmm, makes sense, but would be highly dependent on the type of job.


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## Bahburah (Jul 25, 2013)

Because everyone else is getting one.


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## Apolo (Aug 15, 2014)

Bahburah said:


> Because everyone else is getting one.


Made me think of this lol:


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## chanteuse (May 30, 2014)

Apolo said:


> Hmm, makes sense, but would be highly dependent on the type of job.


Pay per hour of work is a big key for him to feel OK staying. We work average 4 hours a day (the rest we pretend to work). That's a lot less stress and more dough. Our work is tax related and mainly using computer and data base. It's not perfect but we have good benefit, decent pay, and good retirement. Not all public sector jobs are easy with decent pay. Some are very stressful or even dangerous (CIA agent, anyone?)


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## Apolo (Aug 15, 2014)

chanteuse said:


> Pay per hour of work is a big key for him to feel OK staying. We work average 4 hours a day (the rest we pretend to work). That's a lot less stress and more dough. Our work is tax related and mainly using computer and data base. It's not perfect but we have good benefit, decent pay, and good retirement. Not all public sector jobs are easy with decent pay. Some are very stressful or even dangerous (CIA agent, anyone?)


I wanted to go into Clandestine Operations when I first enlisted in the Army, now I am on a path toward Counter Intel... Close, but better suited to family life.


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