I am not a college graduate yet nor a parent, however I will share my personal thoughts and opinions.
Humanities and social sciences cover a wide range of subjects. I personally do not believe that all humanities related professions are not high paying - for example, I consider clinical psychology to be a humanities related fields. Regardless of how much money people make working in humanities and social sciences related careers, humanities and social sciences are still relevant in many areas - in schools, in trying to understand today’s society, in museums, in children’s development, in hospitals, in institutional care, in foster care and adoption, in the care of elderly et cetera. Also, many careers that are not high-paying are extremely important - for example, child care workers and infant care providers do not necessarily earn very high wages, but are crucial in today’s society.
I definitely agree that choice of major affects what jobs one is eligible to apply for. For example, to state the obvious, a secondary school teacher needs to have strong subject knowledge in order to teach that subject at secondary level. However, thinking about this makes me think of at least 2 things: if a prospective college student had a specific career in mind, if he or she had the resources to do so wouldn’t he or she already have done research into what would be the best course of action? Also, is there are a rule saying college graduates must aim to get a job that is high-paying, and must aim to get a job that either requires a degree or is directly related to the subject that he or she got a degree in? Personally when I was considering whether to go to college or not, though a career path I though I may be interested in after college was one that definitely does not require college, I thought that knowledge in a specific subject at college level would be very useful for that vocation.
I think that making enough money to have basic needs met - food, clean clothing, clean and safe shelter, healthcare access, feeding and taking care of one’s family et cetera - is good and important, but one makes enough to meet those needs and those needs are met to be that is good enough. I think that it is better for a student to study something he or he has interest in and concern for, and can use to contribute to society, than for a student to get a degree in something he or she had little interest in even though it makes him or her eligible to apply for several very high-paying jobs. Honestly I think that if a student tries to get a degree at college in something he or she has little interest in for the sole purpose of getting a job, that might lead him or her to be unsuccessful in passing degree course requirements, and even if he or she does pass the degree course in this hypothetical situation to me it seems questionable his or strengths were utilised well.
Personally, while I do not believe that college should be mandatory for high school graduates even for those with the opportunity to attend, I am now a college student out of my own choice. I definitely did not decide to go to college simply to get a high-paying job. Rather, I have decided to attend college because I want to acquire knowledge during the course of my college study that I can use to help others, regardless of what my future occupation ends up to be.