[scarabchuck]

There seem to be a lot of different opinions on this subject. One things for sure, there is huge divide developing between the degreed and non.

I do not have a degree. When I started in my profesion it was not needed. What was needed was a willingness to learn and work your way up thru the ranks. I am what was called a draftsmen... which has morphed into what is called a design engineer.
I started out in the blueprint room running prints for the senior draftsmen. Sure at that same time I was in a die design and auto body design program at MCC. Also some of the people that were a little older than myself went to Philpot or Batavia training. In my eyes those people that took those two courses knew it all. Unfortunatley they weren't available by the time I got into the field.
Back then you worked your way from the blueprint room to the drafting board, doing small things for the seniors , and eventually you became a draftsmen. The reason I did not continue at MCC was I was actually learning more at work than I was in school and getting paid for it. And it was happening a lot faster at work. And in a matter of a few years I went from $20k a year to $70k+ so it was pretty hard for me to see a reason to continue the schooling. At that time draftsmen or designers were seperate from the engineers , well now the trend is actually combining the two. So now you have degreed and non competeing for the same job. Does the company want experience vs schooling. Can both of us do the job.. sure. I've worked right along side people with degrees and have had to teach them things... and I've also learned some things from them. So as far as my profesion goes , you do not need a degree to do it , and the sad thing is the trend is you need a degree to do anything. There are some professions that do need it , (doctor's , lawyers etc.) but right now in some cases I think really good people are getting passed up just because they don't have the degree. This isn't the case in all professions but in my I believe it is.

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by cbmsu01

Why does the idea that people growing up in Michigan feel that they don't need to go to college because they can get a job with the Big 3 keep getting perpetuated? It hasn't been like that since the 1970s, and I don't think many residents seem to feel that way either. Most young people seemed to at least try college from what I'm aware of, but still, it seems like a lot of commentators continue the stereotype.

What do you think?

Some of the commentators are too dull to realize that the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, Wayne State University, Eastern Michigan University, Grand Valley State University, Western Michigan University, and a bunch of other four year colleges and universities, some of which even have the word "Michigan" in their names, are located in Michigan.

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by scarabchuck

Yeah , unfortunately most jobs require one now a day's. I actually saw a job posting that paid $15-17 an hour that required a degree. Now for those that spent the money to get a degree.. that is a slap in the face. I hate to get in a debate about "degreed vs non" but it seems there is a huge divide developing ...

Get used to it. Heck, $15-17/hour is a whole lot better than being completely unemployed or being employed for less than that, which is probably the case for many unfortunate college graduates.

As more and more people go to college, the value of a college degree decreases. Unless having an increasing supply of college-educated people magically increases the number of jobs that make use of a college education, the value of a college degree will only continue to decrease as a higher and higher percentage of the populace attended college.

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by kazoopilot

I would seriously suggest skipping or delaying college unless you hae a specific career goal in mind - doctor, lawyer, professor, etc.

Even having a specific career goal in mind won't necessarily help all that much. It's extremely difficult to get a tenure track job as a professor today since we have a tremendous oversupply of PhDs, even science PhDs. Lawyers are now a penny-a-dozen too, with the ABA continuing to accredit new law schools and with the law schools pumping out two or three times as many new JDs as their are legal jobs available for them. Heading med and becoming a doctor is still a pretty good gig for now but only the best and brightest will be able to climb over the horde of other applicants hoping to make it into the medical profession sanctuary.

[MonkeyButler7000]

Originally Posted by Bhaalspawn

Even having a specific career goal in mind won't necessarily help all that much. It's extremely difficult to get a tenure track job as a professor today since we have a tremendous oversupply of PhDs, even science PhDs. Lawyers are now a penny-a-dozen too, with the ABA continuing to accredit new law schools and with the law schools pumping out two or three times as many new JDs as their are legal jobs available for them. Heading med and becoming a doctor is still a pretty good gig for now but only the best and brightest will be able to climb over the horde of other applicants hoping to make it into the medical profession sanctuary.

This is unless we end up with socialized medicine. Then the brightest and best will stop becoming doctors since they won't just want to be government employees. The trend away from medicine has already started due to malpratice lawsuits and insurance costs.

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by MittenDweller82

...however, move to say...Chicago, (where 4,000 positions are open on careerbuilder today...

I don't disagree with you about the need for people to flee Michigan, but note that 4000/jobs available doesn't seem like much for a city and metropolitan population the size of Chicago.

and suddenly your degree will do wonders for you.

Are you implying that Chicago has a shortage of college degree holders? Has Chicago been miraculously exempt from the nation's economic recession and mass layoffs of college-educated employees?

get tired of that mantra "college is a waist of time" yip yip, if it was such a waste of time employers would not be seeking educated candidates.

Are they seeking educated people because the jobs actually make use of the college education and they really need a college educated workforce or are they seeking educated people because there is an oversupply of them and they can thus easily require having a college education as a proxy for a 95+ IQ and responsibility?

Just what percentage of all of the jobs in the nation actually make use of and require having college training? In the past before the education-arms-race started, presumably a great many of these jobs were filled by merely bright high school graduates (who would go to college today) who worked their way up.

My radical and very politically incorrect and unconventional view is that we don't need nearly as much college education as we have today and that, consequently, a tremendous amount of economic resources--time and money--are being wasted on college education that is either in excess of what the market really needs and/or will never have any useful or practical value, constituting a huge economic inefficiency. (When we train far more PhD scientists, MBAs, and lawyers, etc., than what the job market can properly employ, it constitutes a net economic loss for our economy.)

(For context, I have three college degrees including an advanced science degree and a professional degree. Reaching the above conclusion required a radical change in my mindset brought about by an increased context of knowledge that I acquired as I aged and learned more about the world.)

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by MonkeyButler7000

This is unless we end up with socialized medicine. Then the brightest and best will stop becoming doctors since they won't just want to be government employees. The trend away from medicine has already started due to malpratice lawsuits and insurance costs.

It's hard to say.

First off, under true laissez-faire capitalism, the number of doctors wouldn't end up being limited by the number of currently-existing medical schools and residency slots since there would be less regulation and more private medical schools would come into existence to meet demand, increasing the supply of doctors to proper market levels and perhaps decreasing doctors' monetary compensation, status, and working conditions. Imagine what it would be like if the market for doctors were similar to the market for MBAs and lawyers--an oversupply of practitioners complete with unemployment, underemployment, and heavy competitive pressures.

Secondly, what we have right now is already heavily socialistic and people are still breaking down the doors to get into medical school. The difference is that the form of semi-socialized medicine that we have today is expensive and inefficient compared to the costs of having a proper, outright socialized medicine system.

Is it possible that doctors might be happier and better off under socialized medicine where they could focus on providing medicine and not have to worry about health insurance and malpractice insurance, etc.? What if they were paid as much as they are paid today or even paid more money. (The amount of monetary waste in our current system is such that it may be possible that some of it could be used to pay doctors more while still allowing us to save money.)

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by MittenDweller82

Your right, my doctor I see, he has only a HS diploma, as well as my dentist. I let them both operate freely on me without any training. Are you serious? If college education yielded nothing but debt all higher learning institutions would have folded long ago. We should go tell all of the MBA's at UM that they can expect no return on their investments, we also should notify every student at Harvard and Yale that their degrees will yield beans and the opportunity to work at Wendy's. I'm not sure I've met a sole that was enrolled while I was in college that just "wanted" to be there.

But remember, the overwhelming majority of colleges and professional schools are not ranked as Top 10 or even Top 20 schools like Harvard, Stanford, Yale, and Michigan. Rather, your average college does not have a national reputation and is more like Eastern Michigan University.

A more interesting question might be, will the average law school graduate from Podunk U. (not Columbia U.) earn enough money working as a lawyer to be able to pay off his massive student loans?

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by Ivorytickler

This is why jobs are leaving our shore. The unions bled the companies dry. So now, no one has a job. At least the educated can follow the work. Not so for blue collar. They'd never work for the wages being paid elsewhere.

Even if the Unions hadn't bled the manufacturing companies dry, manufacturing jobs and knowledge-based jobs would still leave because it's extremely difficult to compete against fifty-cents an hour and no environmental regulations and no labor regulations and lower taxes and no need for benefits and government incentives and subsidies, etc.

[Bhaalspawn]

Originally Posted by MGD

Law I think is good if you can see the trends where law will be needed or can work for peanuts at a nonprofit or state job...or will go into your own business. I have always been told I would be great at law...but I can't trust my bread and butter to that in this economy of the next few years...I think it's more relevant in many fields than the MBA, which is getting cliche UNLESS it's from a NAME BRAND school (meaning, Ivy League or damn near)...

You should do your homework before heading to law school. The notion that all lawyers are well off is a huge myth which non-lawyers believe and which helps drive up law school enrollments. The very sad reality is that our nation has been producing two or three times as many new lawyers as the job market can accommodate. Consequently, it's an extremely competitive and very miserable field with often low pay and long hours. You might start your research here:

End of ESQ.
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