Is Higher Education Overrated?

I’m writing this article today not so much about the value of gaining knowledge through education but rather the perceived benefit of education in being successful making a living. There is no denying the fact that many people do go on to universities and earn a degree allowing them to get a decent job working in the field of their choice. But the question I’d like to look at today is, is this the rule or the exception.

I remember during the earlier years of life right up through my early 20s, I was always told that if you wanted to make a good living you needed to do good in school so that you would be able to go to college and get a degree.

I didn't do great in school but I did good enough I guess and went onto college and then two different universities. I received a degree in computer information systems, and for the next two years worked in sock mills under the management of others who were at times former classmates who had dropped out of high school and had been working their way "up the ladder" while I earned my degree. After two years, I was wanting to get married but couldn't afford to even move out on my own much less try to support a wife so I decided to get a CDL license and drive a truck.

So, what's my point. I've got friends who even now are paying right around $1,000 a month, trying to earn a degree that will hopefully allow them to get a great job paying a whopping $30,000 a year fresh out of college. I've talked with others who know some that are paying half again as much and still coming out of the universities with close to 6 digits in debt. And the sad truth of the matter is that most of them are having the same experience that I had.I was reading an article the other day. It told of how 80% of last years graduates are living with their parents due to the fact that if they are able to find work at all, many of them are delivering pizzas or working at jobs paying little above minimum wage.

To tell the truth, most of the really successful people that I know either didn’t even attend a university or college, or they have been successful in a field totally removed from the field of their degree. Personally, in hindsight, I wish I had taken the money I spent on education and had used it to get set up in my own business years earlier. I believe it would have been a better investment.