Do you really earn more money because you went to college?

[Candystripes]

It's honestly retarded how much more they pay for graduates. Yes I earn way more because of my diploma. Just a sheet of paper.

[300]

It depends a lot on what field you eventually go into and what you make of your college experience.  Some jobs, like engineering, require a college education so you at least know the basics.  But there are a lot of areas that don't require a college diploma to do well.

True. For some jobs (like an engineer or a surgeon, for example), there is really no other choice than going to college. Nobody is going to let you perform brain surgery or design a bridge if you don't hold the relevant qualifications. Then there are jobs like scientist and so on where a college degree is a huge help, but not technically mandatory. And then finally there are jobs like entrepreneur or programmer where a degree doesn't really help that much, if at all.

[Bizmark13]

The money spend on college would be better spend on business or investment instead.

for example investing in bitcoin

if the money spent on collages was spent on bitcoin 4-5 years ago

you would be a millionaire

This is so true. Too bad I came into Bitcoin a year too late. I made a thread about this a while ago titled "You are transported to January 2013. What do you do?":

What would you do if you were transported to January 2013?

I would:

Buy $2,000 worth of Tesla stock at $30, sell at $250 in March 2014. Profit = $17,000
Buy $2,000 worth of bitcoins at $13, sell at $1200 in November. Profit = $200,000
Buy $2,000 worth of litecoins at $0.07, sell at $48 in November. Profit = $1,400,000!!

Then I would retire.

Instead, being the idiot that I am, I did the following:

Bought 1 year of college education for $6,000, unable to sell. Profit = $0.

[Lorenzo]

STEP 1: GO TO COLLEGE
STEP 2: DROP OUT

Most successful people dropped out of college. Notice the word "dropped out". This is different from having never attended. Bill Gates (Microsoft), Steve Jobs (Apple), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Richard Branson* (Virgin), Michael Dell (Dell), Larry Ellison (Oracle), Larry Page and Sergey Brin* (Google), Sean Parker (Napster and the first President of Facebook), the guy who made CNN, the list goes on...

Got a computer? Chances are, it's running either Windows (Gates) or OS X (Jobs). Got a phone? It's probably either an iPhone (Jobs), a Windows phone (Gates), or an Android phone (Page/Brin). Want to look something up? You'll probably either use Google (Page/Brin) or Bing (Gates).

*Technically, Branson was a high school dropout and the guys from Google dropped out of their postgrad programs but you get the idea.

EDIT: Elon Musk (Tesla) also dropped out of his postgrad:

He moved to California to pursue a PhD in applied physics at Stanford but left the program after two days to pursue his entrepreneurial aspirations in the areas of the Internet, renewable energy and outer space.

EDIT 2: The Ethereum guy, another dropout:

So what’s his background? Buterin attended college for a year -- and then left due to Bitcoin opportunities. "I don’t regret it," he said. "Look at what I’m doing now."

So the message seems to be that in order to be successful, generally you need to go to college (well, except Branson). But if there is one common thread that unites the most successful people of the world, then it is the fact that they proceeded to drop out of college in order to follow their dreams and aspirations.

Not to mention college dropouts are over-represented among list of the billionaires.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_college_dropout_billionaires

The average net worth of billionaires who dropped out of college, $9.4 billion, is approximately triple that of billionaires with Ph.D.s, $3.2 billion. Even if one removes Bill Gates, who left Harvard University and is now worth $66.0 billion, college dropouts are worth $5.3 billion on average, compared to those who finished only bachelor's degrees, who are worth $2.9 billion.

You forgot to mention the founders of Oculus, Snapchat, WordPress, Dropbox and Tumblr. If I remember correctly, the latter dropped out of high school at 14. Pretty amazing if you ask me.

It depends a lot on what field you eventually go into and what you make of your college experience.  Some jobs, like engineering, require a college education so you at least know the basics.  But there are a lot of areas that don't require a college diploma to do well.

True. For some jobs (like an engineer or a surgeon, for example), there is really no other choice than going to college. Nobody is going to let you perform brain surgery or design a bridge if you don't hold the relevant qualifications. Then there are jobs like scientist and so on where a college degree is a huge help, but not technically mandatory. And then finally there are jobs like entrepreneur or programmer where a degree doesn't really help that much, if at all.

We seem to be in agreement here.

I can't tell if you're serious. Yes, the dropped out. But they were also very intelligent and had a great idea that became very successful. What about the thousands of people who dropped out and are living a shitty life right now? But I'm going to take your post as a joke and move on.

Most of his examples (and thus his definition of "successful") seem to be tech entrepreneurs. It probably doesn't translate to other fields.

[JerryCurlzzz]

yeahhhh, i'm pretty sure most people aren't going to strike it rich founding a groundbreaking company.

NEXT.

[HarryT1923]

doctors and lawyers seem to make good money.

[hollowframe]

i make decent money, having gotten a 4 year degree. dunno wtf i'd be doing without one.

[Jamie_Boulder]

I enrolled myself as a trainee into a large company straight out of high school and slaved there for about 2 years, after finishing my schooling (which they paid for) I was eligible for a real job which was a starting salary of 50k a year.

Would pick this path a thousand times over because while everyone @20 years was still poor and in uni I bought my first investment at 21.

[Lethn]

I enrolled myself as a trainee into a large company straight out of high school and slaved there for about 2 years, after finishing my schooling (which they paid for) I was eligible for a real job which was a starting salary of 50k a year.

Would pick this path a thousand times over because while everyone @20 years was still poor and in uni I bought my first investment at 21.

That's the thing, everyone in University/College may be acting smug and superior now but I can guarantee when a great depression rolls around they'll be running around in a panic like headless chickens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u40mJ_ls5VE

Oh and adding to that every person I chat to over the internet about university/College seems bitter as fuck and unconvincingly tells me about how important it is I think even though my path is a difficult one I think I've made the correct one for the long term, I'd also like to point out as well now that a couple of my friends who aren't in university have already come back from doing courses and stuff and they're trying to figure out what to do with their lives because they didn't plan ahead.

Exact same thing will happen with the people I know going to University or more than likely they'll get a job in something that has absolutely nothing to do with what they originally studied, I can tell you something personal but my brother went for a masters degree in History and now he's basically doing tech support and fixing computers because that's where his skillset is. There's only one person I know of who actually went and did what they studied and that's his g/f but that's because she planned ahead properly and decided what she wanted to do and took the right degree and the right specialisation.

gg education system.

I would like to point out that I don't actually have anything against the idea of someone getting a degree in general, but you damn well better make sure you don't waste 4 years of your life studying sociology or any bullshit like that when you want to just be an electrician or something, no matter how much people try to beat it into you it just isn't worth the amount of time you waste.

[boumalo]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

    High school drop outs: $18,734
    High school graduates: $27,915
    College grads (with a bachelor’s degree): $51,206
    Advanced degree holders: $74,602

I know this can be debated depending on the college tuition of going to that particular college.

But whats the average college debt for a student. $23,000? hopefully to pay it off within in a year? this is outside from other personal debts of course, with living costs. If you think $23,000 is small money you have no idea then. Plus I forgot the interest thats added.

And thats if you get a job right.

You have to count average college tuition per year * number of years + what you would have won if you didn't go to college and interests on all that = more than 100,000$

You have to count the revenues after tax so the difference is less between grads and non grads because grads pay more taxes

Then you have to take factor in that high schools graduates, college grads and advances degree holders were smarter, more connected and more success driven even before going into studies so they would have perform better than average anyway!!

[HarmonLi]

smugness on one side, bitterness on the other.

[leex1528]

It is absolutely insane.  I have a computer science degree and am working at a help desk right now.

So I apply to companies to be a programmer.

"We are looking for someone with experience"

How are you looking for someone with experience at an entry level job....ummmm what

[boumalo]

It is absolutely insane.  I have a computer science degree and am working at a help desk right now.

So I apply to companies to be a programmer.

"We are looking for someone with experience"

How are you looking for someone with experience at an entry level job....ummmm what

When everyone has a degree, the value of each degree goes down

The number of good jobs is going down because of heavy regulation and the state intervening in most markets; on the last job report we can clearly see a huge loss in full-time jobs replaced by part-time jobs

[LostDutchman]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

Nope.

Never earned a Goddamned dime from any of my four degrees.

[bluefirecorp]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

Nope.

Never earned a Goddamned dime from any of my four degrees.

Seems like an obvious solution would be to get a fifth degree!

[LostDutchman]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

Nope.

Never earned a Goddamned dime from any of my four degrees.

Seems like an obvious solution would be to get a fifth degree!

Yeah, I got that for sure!

A Doctorate in The School of Hard Knocks!

[bluefirecorp]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

Nope.

Never earned a Goddamned dime from any of my four degrees.

Seems like an obvious solution would be to get a fifth degree!

Yeah, I got that for sure!

A Doctorate in The School of Hard Knocks!

Why not do a thesis on Funny Walks?

[LostDutchman]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

Nope.

Never earned a Goddamned dime from any of my four degrees.

Seems like an obvious solution would be to get a fifth degree!

Yeah, I got that for sure!

A Doctorate in The School of Hard Knocks!

Why not do a thesis on Funny Walks?

Not a bad idea but it's been done:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZlBUglE6Hc

[bluefirecorp]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

Nope.

Never earned a Goddamned dime from any of my four degrees.

Seems like an obvious solution would be to get a fifth degree!

Yeah, I got that for sure!

A Doctorate in The School of Hard Knocks!

Why not do a thesis on Funny Walks?

Not a bad idea but it's been done:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZlBUglE6Hc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xECUrlnXCqk

(and it was a pun)

[LostDutchman]

People that go to college are in average brighter, harder working, more ambitious and for more affluante families and they are meant to make more money (as a group) than people that don't go to college

If you factor in the cost of going to college will you really make more money because of the diploma you will get?

Support : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbUFBk3477o (few minutes video debating the subject)

Nope.

Never earned a Goddamned dime from any of my four degrees.

Seems like an obvious solution would be to get a fifth degree!

Yeah, I got that for sure!

A Doctorate in The School of Hard Knocks!

Why not do a thesis on Funny Walks?

Not a bad idea but it's been done:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZlBUglE6Hc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xECUrlnXCqk

(and it was a pun)

I know, I was just having some fun!