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Since when does ONE person count as “many”? I have worked for a state and for the federal government and both use contract employees to do janitorial work, even in the buildings owned by the state/feds. My understanding is that in the past, the state used to pay its own janitors, but now they just use companies to do the work. That article also indicates that the average pay is only $50K, in SF, which is basically poverty level wages.
Come on now. The other poster said that they doubted "very many" janitors made six figures. You bringing up an extreme case where someone is working over 100 hours a week is not "very many".
Based on your screen name, you ought to be posting rational things.
about a career path I would say, well you can either go to college rack up a boatload of student debt and maybe not find a job in your chosen field or worse yet find yourself working at Starbucks.
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For the record I am a college grad. But 30 years ago having a degree was a ticket to making a good living. Not so much today. I think high school counselors are doing kids a disservice buy say you gotta go to college to make it.
Nonsense. Might as well tell the 18-year old to go jump off a cliff.
A good way to go to college and not rack up debt is to go to an in-state public school and not be picky about school choice.
If income vs cost is the only concern, then you are correct. there are more job openings and compared to many, possibly most bachelor degrees they will put you in a better financial position for the majority of your life.
However you also need to tell the kid that the redundant skilled task they mastered after five years, that is exactly what they will be doing every day eight or twelve hours a day in ten years, and twenty years and thirty years. they had better really love that redundant task.
While a college degree may not earn as much early on, especially after deducting loan payments for the first 20 or more years, it is more adaptable and leads to promotions and changes in jobs titles and responsibility. A tech certificate will also lead to some promotions, but it will not go far and the job will not change much, except for a very very few elite individuals.
A lot depends on your choice of college degree. Too many college kids are choosing career paths where there are few or no jobs or even majors that are basically useless. A good choice will eventually be more lucrative however.
I went to law school. Later I figured out when I got ahead after factoring in my student loans, Years spent learning instead of earning, starting a the base pay at age 27 instead of 18. I compared that to my college job (driving an excursion boat) and assumed I would work my way up to bigger boats (a friend of mine did). i discovered that I would start getting ahead financially at about age 37. However I then jumped ahead massively every year after than until about age 48 when you more or less top out - but that top out could be anywhere from $150K to a million or more a year.
So financially lawyer was a better option.
But which is the better lifestyle? trying big cases took a serious toll on my health and limited my family and vacation time. 16 hours days for months on end were not uncommon. Eventually I got sick of it (not so much trying cases as the mixed pressure of trying cases, marketing for new clients, keeping up to date and improving technical skills, managing a business and watching out for and deflecting backstabbing smarmy peers). I "stepped down" to a more pleasant but still challenging but considerably less lucrative in house position. If i had followed the boat captain path, I might still be very happy doing it and probably making close to the same that i am right now. Maybe more if I ended up on a big cruise ship or commercial boat.
Driving a boat may not be a fair comparison because it is a wonderful job. I am not sure if you would ever come to hate it. Being a lawyer, at least a trial lawyer, you will eventually hate it at least most of the time.
However, financially I can say with certainty that as a boat captain, even if I were able to make as much as my current salary for the next ten or so years, My lifetime earnings would be a fraction of the lifetime earning as a lawyer.
Of course now, law school is a poor choice for most students. It will pan out only for the few exemplary students who attend exemplary law schools and become exemplary lawyers (plus another few who are exceptionally good at marketing, or have family business connections). However there are still many good career choices for college students to choose.
Setting finances aside, other choices lead to a better quality of life overall. Take teaching for example. Yes you are poor for your whole life, but you have comparatively an immense amount of time to do cool things. I get a paltry 3-4 weeks of variation, and i usually only take 2 - 2.5. My daughter, a teacher, gets about 11 weeks a year off of work. Yes she has to skimp to make ends meet, but her salary is not horrible (not anymore anyway). She bought a small house, drives a newer car than I do, has a cool dog, goes places and does things. She does not go out to fancy dinners, or go to expensive theater shows more than once or twice a year, but she still has fun with her time off. It is not lucrative, but it is a very nice lifestyle. Which is better?
^^ I agree with most of your post, and I believe I have said similar on other threads of this nature. The time you put into college and the income you forgo by doing so can more than be made up by increased earnings with a degree, plus more opportunity for advancement.
Take my profession, nursing. You can go to CC for a CNA program of 1 semester, after which you will earn on average $11.54/hr (roughly $22K per year). OR, you can go to a 2 year RN program (in my area the AAS in Nursing program is about 2 1/2 calendar years, about 7 semesters) and earn on average ~$60K for a starting salary, up to and average of $71K for 20+ years experience. OR, you can get a BSN and start at about the same salary as an AAS nurse, but make more $ as time goes on. On average, a BSN makes $82K for 20+ years experience. So the $44K-$88K you give up to go further than a CNA can easily be made up and exceeded as time goes on. There is also more opportunity for advancement to supervisory positions, especially at the BSN level. The only opportunity for advancement for a CNA is to become a "lead" CNA. A CNA cannot be a head nurse, supervisor, etc. https://nursejournal.org/bsn-degree/...n-differences/ https://www.mycnajobs.com/caregiver-cna-pay/
Last edited by Katarina Witt; 12-28-2018 at 09:22 PM..
While I agree with the bolded, I disagree about the kids. Sure they may play video games, but they aren't distracted from the world. The read the news. And while many of them have the typical young person's idealistic vision of the world, they understand the world isn't created for them. They hold down jobs while in school just like we did, they study, they play sports. These aren't the millennials anymore. The oldest millennials are now how old, late 30s. Even the youngest are well into their 20s. The problem for most of them is they entered the work world just at the peak of the dot com and tech boom where those companies were paying outrageous salaries even for entry workers and then it crashed back to realistic salaries. So the millennials just missed the good times and resented it.
This current generation is more balanced. The real problem for them is we are doing them a disservice by pushing the "everyone should go to college" mantra in schools. The reality is not every kid is suited for college or a desk job. Each is different and some are talented with their hands and would be happier in craft work rather than staring at a computer all day.
Part of the issue is those who push the "college degrees earn more" may know the statistics, but don't understand them. Sure, college degrees earn more precisely because they ARE hard to get and there ARE a limited number of people who can get them. If somehow you pushed every single kid through college, they would, first, have to lower standards so everyone could graduate, devaluing the degree, and second, value would drop because everyone has one. We see this today within college degrees. The degrees that most likely lead to higher pay are the hardest to get.
As an X'er, I'm not worried about the Z's currently in school or just graduating.
Seriously? Newspaper readership is constantly going down, especially among millennials. Mills may watch the news.
Actually, both of my millennial daughters graduated in 2009, one from grad school (Physical Therapy) and the other from undergrad (biology). It was tough times finding jobs. The older one was willing to relocate, which a lot of her classmates weren't (or couldn't if married). She got a FT job while some of her classmates had to put together a couple of part time jobs. She's still working for the same hospital group, though not at the original hospital where she started.
The younger took a job at a day care, then decided to go back to grad school. She got an MPH and is working in research for the U of MN.
That's what they said about us Boomers, too, back in 1970. As people get older, their needs/wants change.
Nice micro-agression there, tnff. I understand statistics JUST FINE. 36% of 25-34 yos have college degrees. That is more than 1 of 3, and is likely higher in the younger group, say 25-29, than the older ones 30-34. No one, no one, has EVER suggested "pushing everyone through college". https://www.census.gov/content/dam/C...mo/p20-578.pdf
Seriously? Newspaper readership is constantly going down, especially among millennials. Mills may watch the news.
Actually, both of my millennial daughters graduated in 2009, one from grad school (Physical Therapy) and the other from undergrad (biology). It was tough times finding jobs. The older one was willing to relocate, which a lot of her classmates weren't (or couldn't if married). She got a FT job while some of her classmates had to put together a couple of part time jobs. She's still working for the same hospital group, though not at the original hospital where she started.
The younger took a job at a day care, then decided to go back to grad school. She got an MPH and is working in research for the U of MN.
That's what they said about us Boomers, too, back in 1970. As people get older, their needs/wants change.
Nice micro-agression there, tnff. I understand statistics JUST FINE. 36% of 25-34 yos have college degrees. That is more than 1 of 3, and is likely higher in the younger group, say 25-29, than the older ones 30-34. No one, no one, has EVER suggested "pushing everyone through college". https://www.census.gov/content/dam/C...mo/p20-578.pdf
Your daughter had trouble getting a position as at PT?? My mother was a PT, and there were always shortages. At the University of Alberta, it is the most difficult faculty to get into, and requires the highest grades of any. It also pays well once a PT graduates, at and average $45.26/hour.
Your daughter had trouble getting a position as at PT?? My mother was a PT, and there were always shortages. At the University of Alberta, it is the most difficult faculty to get into, and requires the highest grades of any. It also pays well once a PT graduates, at and average $45.26/hour.
No, my DD did not have trouble getting a job as a PT. We were in a recession in 2009. She got a job in Colorado Springs where she had done a clinical. I'm well aware of the qualifications of the students. It's the same here in the US.
Last edited by Katarina Witt; 12-28-2018 at 11:15 PM..
Seriously? Newspaper readership is constantly going down, especially among millennials. Mills may watch the news.
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I said "read the news" not "read the newspaper." They have multiple sources they get it from.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katarina Witt
[b][color="darkred"]...Actually, both of my millennial daughters graduated in 2009, one from grad school (Physical Therapy) and the other from undergrad (biology). It was tough times finding jobs. The older one was willing to relocate, which a lot of her classmates weren't (or couldn't if married). She got a FT job while some of her classmates had to put together a couple of part time jobs. She's still working for the same hospital group, though not at the original hospital where she started.
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Ok, that's kind of what I said. 1999 was booming. 2009 was crash.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katarina Witt
...Nice micro-agression there, tnff. I understand statistics JUST FINE. 36% of 25-34 yos have college degrees. That is more than 1 of 3, and is likely higher in the younger group, say 25-29, than the older ones 30-34. No one, no one, has EVER suggested "pushing everyone through college". https://www.census.gov/content/dam/C...mo/p20-578.pdf
Being able to quote a percentage does not get into the meaning behind the statistics. For a college degree to pay more, there has to be more job openings that degree holders. When more people have the degree than there are jobs, the price companies are willing to pay for those jobs goes down. You say that no one is pushing college for everyone, so do you support bringing back Vo-Tech education into high school? When should we suggest to students they've be better off in a trade -- before they graduate high school or after the fail out of college?
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