Saying No to College

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<p>The vast majority of high school graduates are not living in homeless shelters, so there must be many such jobs.</p>

<p>Not having a degree is a disadvantage, particularly in this economy.</p>

<p>I know of two men, late 40s-early 50s, who have large families they are trying to support. Neither had a degree. One is an electrician but in our city, it’s been exceedingly hard for him to find a job. He’s been underemployeed for years and actually went to Afghanistan for a year for 50K just to get food on the table for his family. He got laid off (again) two days before Thanksgiving.</p>

<p>The other man has only experience as a gardener, a pastor, and he’s now trying to start his own karate school/business. He was a pastor but there’s no money for his position now. They are near their “fiscal cliff”.</p>

<p>I have another friend, a man in his 60s who’s super intellegent but did not get a degree. He’s been living in poverty for many years as he tried to get various jobs.</p>

<p>I do have more stories, but you get the idea.</p>

<p>My own dh, by God’s grace, has had a stable job as a driver for a well known company for 22 years. He does not have a degree and there’s no way he’d get in at his company these days. I’m so grateful for his job.</p>

<p>Opt for the degree if you can.</p>

<p>Beliavsky–again, what are those jobs that are lucrative enough to forgo college?</p>

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<p>^well there is that as a fall back career:eek:</p>

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<p>See? Who needs to waste time and money learning calculus, French history, accounting, and philosophy? College is not at all necessary for a successful career. For a young, outgoing gal with a good body, a little practice with the dance pole is all she needs for a very successful career.</p>

<p>After 4 pages of presumably educated adults working in various fields, other than the military suggestion, no one has been able to come up with a viable option for an 18 year old high school graduate that could earn enough money to move out of mom and dad’s basement and fully support themselves (housing, transportation costs, health insurance, contributing to retirement accounts, food, clothing).</p>

<p>SteveMA, they can do that working full time at MacDonald’s, waiting tables, working at Barnes & Noble, construction, and a number of other jobs (I don’t know our tenants as well as my H) as long as they don’t live alone and are willing to live with roommates. We RENT to kids like that all the time and they manage to pay their utilities, rent, cable and they all seem to have cell phones and beat up cars or trucks. My 23 year old is doing that at a hair’s breath above the equivalent of minimum wage and an ancient Ford Escort. He’s getting new tires from us as a Christmas present. I doubt they are contributing to retirement accounts at 19, but even college graduates don’t contribute to retirement accounts 100% of the time right off the bat. Our son is not although we’ve told him he should try for at least 1% next year or the equivalent of his next raise. I don’t know about your kids, but mine don’t expect to live like they did with “us” at their age. I don’t know about you but I didn’t live like my parents at that age. I suspect many kids living in their parents basement are doing so because it’s EASY to do that. No one said it’s easy to be an adult.</p>

<p>"^well there is that as a fall back career"</p>

<p>well they cant all go to Univ Arizona first.</p>

<p>The problem with retail and fast food is that they don’t want to pay benefits so they hire many part-timers instead of fewer full-time employees. It would be challenging to get full time work without a college diploma in my area. We have many working poor here.</p>

<p>As I tell my kids you gotta start somewhere :slight_smile: mostly the bottom, even with a college degree. Be humble, work hard, learn. raise your hand and volunteer…works in college, works in the workforce when you are young.</p>

<p>It is not an either/or proposition. There are many, many “tradespeople” who go into their trades after graduating from college, and they value their educations as much as anyone else. My hairdresser, for example, has an MFA in painting. She’s very happy and successful in her career and I expect that she’d be deeply offended if anyone were to suggest that her education was “wasted.”</p>

<p>momofthreeboys–then the kids you rent to are not fully supporting themselves if they don’t have health insurance, etc. Our kids DO contribute to their retirement plans at work, our oldest is doing 6% because we told him to budget for that so he never gets used to that money. We did keep him on our health insurance because it doesn’t cost us anything extra and would cost him about $80/month. He is putting that extra money into savings for his house. He certainly doesn’t live high on the hog but he is ok with his life as a young 20 something kid.</p>

<p>Around here, the $8/hour wouldn’t cut it for doing any of the above unless they lived in a flea trap place with several roommates and getting full time hours working at McDonalds, etc. is very difficult.</p>

<p>There are plenty of jobs for those opting out of college. I think the main reason no one is listing them, Steve, is that most people here think of them as less than “real” jobs.</p>

<p>My brother lived on his own right out of high school and never looked back, starting out as a laborer in construction and learning on the job. He’s very successful now running his own company with all the appropriate “must haves” on Steve’s list.</p>

<p>One of his daughters is the manager of an auto shop based ONLY on her self-taught skills in auto mechanics. She has benefits, a paid-off new model car and money to live on.</p>

<p>Another niece of mine just bought her own house after working for all but the last couple of years in the retail job she started in high school. She did go to college but didn’t get a job in her field very soon. She still works at the retail job on weekends if they need an extra hand. She was indeed supporting herself in retail.</p>

<p>Her mom has a degree but bought her condo and put both girls through college in a sewing specialty store-job based on skills she learned at home sewing for fun-no degree needed.</p>

<p>My S has no degree and a couple of certificates in the trades but got his job based on his self-taught ability to fix or figure out anything mechanical. He is the only non-degreed person in the company. The job is so specialized that there isn’t even a program that teaches it-most of the people he works with have some kind of science background though. </p>

<p>So there are just a few examples for ya, Steve. And I’ll add a flip side-I have a degree-in journalism, and when the small paper I used to work for shut it’s local office a decade ago, I was told I was "unemployable. I now works as a secretary with me self-taught MS Office skills and ability to be a calm influence on the stressed people who call my church-for more than I made as a writer. Go figure.</p>

<p>Because this is a "college “forum” I think most people have college on the brain, but the reality is only about half the kids that start college finish and not all kids go to college so there are many, many kids that are self sufficient and making their way in the world albeit maybe not yet contributing to retirement plans and more than a few without health insurance. My guess is there are MORE college educated kids living in parent basements than kids who didn’t go to college and moved out of the parental home because those kids are blindsided when they realize they aren’t walking into a $32,000 or more job. Quality of life is in the eyes of the beholder so it all depends on how you define “quality.” I would assume independence is an important quality of life issue that the vast majority of kids reach for, so I imagine that many post high school kids get their rears in gear and make it work, whether it’s one job or piecing together jobs so that they don’t have to live in their parents basement. Only speculative on part, but honestly the only kids that are oldest two son’s ages (21 and almost 24) that are living with parents are friends who DID attend colleges, the rest are on their own.</p>

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<p>While that can be true, isn’t a bachelor’s degree expected for military *officers<a href=“since%20you%20mentioned%20General%20of%20the%20Armies,%20an%20officer%20rank”>/i</a>?</p>

<p>According to the most recent census, and you can look it up if you need to, but I’m not going to wade through it for you, around 60% of high school graduates go on to attend college. around 50% of these graduate college. 30% of adults have a college degree. I don’t think 70% of adults are living in their parent’s basement.</p>

<p>I think the kids can benefit from job training in the trades, or in other areas, and ALOT of four year university grads would have just been better off financially if they’d simply gotten a certificate from a local community college or trade school. If the ONLY reason to attend college is for employment reasons.</p>

<p>Now, all that said, I also happen to know several people in the trades who also have college degrees, one from an institution mentioned on here quite frequently, and this particular philosopher plumber loves his life. FWIW.</p>

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<p>It depends on whether “college” includes community college courses for a vocational certificate or associates degree. If “community colleges are not real colleges”, then there are lots of jobs for which one does not have to get a bachelor’s degree for.</p>

<p>If community colleges are real colleges for this purpose, then the possibilities which do not require additional formal school beyond high school (though they may involve on-the-job training or self-education) include:</p>

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<li>Enlisted military service.</li>
<li>Sales, if one has good sales skills (people seem to have it or not, regardless of schooling).</li>
<li>Self-educate in something and start a small business or work as a contractor or consultant in a field where hiring such is based on one’s work, not credentials.</li>
<li>Live very frugally so that a “living wage” is much lower for you than what most people here assume. This is the route taken by migrant farm workers, many of whom consider the jobs so desirable that they are willing to immigrate illegally to take such jobs.</li>
<li>Jobs that pay well because they are undesirable to most people, because they are noxious (frequent contact with garbage or sewage?), in undesirable locations (Canadian oil fields?), socially frowned upon, or risky in some way.</li>
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