Is college/university a scam? The answer is simply yes. Is it worth it? Maybe.
Today, college is the default choice for people because it is a method of controlling the population. First off, college most often costs boatloads of money, which will be paid back with interest, lots and lots of interest. Secondly, it is part of a work environment, which promotes a caste system. Those who have the right piece of paper get "nice" jobs. The only way to get a great job is to get more education than the others. It creates unnecessary competition between people, in which the winner is the person who goes into debt more or has rich parents. It makes it easier for people to "know their role." Poor people deserve to be poor because they didn't work (commit themselves to a lengthy period of indebtedness) hard enough.
I went to college and got a job in mechanical engineering. Was college worth it for me? In this set of circumstances? Probably. Is it close to the ideal way that I would have liked to do it, in a different world/circumstances? No. I was lucky with college. I got a job doing one of my passions, in a field that also pays well enough to minimize my indebtedness. I certainly wasn't ready to be able to start my own business (a future goal ~5 years, when I'm 30) and the experience I have gotten while working probably wouldn't have been easily available to me in any other way. I'm definitely smart, easily top 10%, but I don't think my college experience is unique for my field. I didn't have to work hardly at all at my classes. There isn't a class that I took that couldn't be shortened down into a week of daylong classes. I would have been much farther ahead if I would have went straight into my job out of high school. I would have gained 4 years more experience in my field, and I would have had more life experience as well. College doesn't teach you about life. You teach yourself about life, by experiencing life, not by trading money for a piece of paper to obtain money.
There are a few degrees/jobs in which it is a worthwhile transaction, but most peoples jobs just use the degree as a screening tool to limit the number of applicants to a manageable number.
To paraphrase/quote John Taylor Gatto a bit, in a few short years, these are going to be the jobs most people will be working in.
1. retail sales person
2. registered nurse
3. cashier
4. general office clerk
5. truck driver
6. managers
7. janitors, cleaners and domestic workers
8. nurse's aides
9. food counter and related workers
10. waiters/waitresses.
Those aren't jobs that need college degrees. It definitely shouldn't be the default choice.
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