[Acting Like Godot]

Offering some food for thought:

Originally Posted by Restrikted

I'm in my second semester at Penn State, and I haven't found what I really want to do just yet.

If you haven't found what you really want to do just yet, how do you know that studying for economics is worse than staying at home learning about stock markets / web systems?

Just to be clear, it's all about money. Every time I think about it, it kills me to think that I'm wasting $10,000 a semester just to get an education which I will probably not use.

Are you underestimating the wider benefits of formal education? I have a law degree, but have stopped practising as a lawyer. Nevertheless I don't regret law school at all - among other things, it provided certain general yet very useful skills such as logical thinking; critical analysis; effective communication; precise writing and so on.

Would your studies not give you any benefits, even if you don't eventualy become an economist?

but if that degree is going to cost ~$80,000, I need to rethink this whole situation.

Surely you would have considered the cost issue, before you applied for college. What has changed now? Your interest in your studies? If so, this seems to be a prime case for considering making a change in your course.

What I really love doing is learning about the stock market and web systems(like php/mysql kind of stuff). I could be at home giving myself value in these fields, and it wouldn't cost me a dime.

Have you considered this? If you are very efficient in managing your time and energy, you could probably do your economics degree AND at the same time learn about stock markets and web systems on your own.

Plenty of people in college spend a very sizeable chunk of their time on activities other than studies. Some of those activities are constructive, and some are arguably not so constructive. For example, many college students are also busy participating in sports, music, cultural activities, student associations, mindless boozing; a lot of partying; a lot of sex; and elective courses outside their main studies.

You could be the economics student who does well in his (her?) studies, while simultaneously pursuing his (her) personal interests in stock markets and web systems.

I know some of you might say to major in Finance, but I couldn't imagine trading stocks for a living.

Just to be clear - a finance degree does not mean that you have to trade stocks for a living. A finance degree provides an obvious route into the financial industry (that means a job in a bank; insurance company; hedge fund; brokerage firm; financial advisory firm), but there are numerous jobs within these organisations, and certainly not just trading stocks.

Who knows? Perhaps one day you will be designing web systems within a bank that can be used to model economic trends affecting stock markets.