Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Today, things are not as different as a lot of people think.
Fact: Under 30% of the workforce, have a college degree.
Fact: Only half of the highly paid STEM jobs require a college education.
Fact: There are lots of high paid jobs, that do not require a college degree.
Fact: There are a large percentage of the college graduates, that are not working in their field of education, but holding other types of jobs. Especially those that have liberal arts, and other non technical degrees.
My HS diploma was good to me. I'm 26, but I went to a decent HS. Learned advanced math, loaded up on AP classes, got some scholarship money that I used in community college. When I apply to jobs, employers are often surprised to see that I even have an associates degree.
Certification are often underappreciated. They keep pushing to standardize my occupation, but as of today, even certs aren't required. Nice if you have them, but most places don't require them unless they are a union shop... And the corps pretty well chased them out of business.
I tend to believe that HS today is not what it was in the 60's. My dad was a sharp guy and never went to college. He was always able to help me with trig, geometry, calc problems when they came up. It's not the piece of paper that makes a person but the knowledge learned. I fear there is very little learning going on in today's HS classrooms though.
As almost everyone says, the answer is a definite yes. But, as everyone also says, it was different back then. For one thing, there was much more manual training for high students who didn't want to go on to college. Also, because of WW II, there was a lot of catching up on needs and wants of the country. This created jobs. So many reasons it was possible back then but not today when even college graduates are having a hard time. Many reasons for that also but I'll skip them. Everyone in the work-a-day world knows them.
A big reason is that there are simply way more people in the US today than there were in the 60's. In the 60's the mindset was that Mom stayed home and took care of the kids and house. Today many of those Mom's have to work.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrRational
... but is college the place to learn filing, typing, order form filling or salesmanship?
You sure don't need college to learn how to do any mechanical trade or even to rise to master level.
Reading and Math? Certainly and with some alacrity too.
It shouldn't have to be but sadly I've seen ads for basic office administration jobs state a college requirement.
I did my high school horror in the mid 70's and never went to college. Back then there were plenty of trades, so it was either-or. No stigma. I got into art and then printing and have done very well on my own. Im going to retire in 10 years and can say my lack of institutional certification has never held me back in any way. I dont think that would be possible today, though. Too much emphasis on certifications and a dearth of trades. I wouldn't want to be coming into this era's work environment in any capacity
I tell young people to consider trades like welding, of which local unions have excellent apprenticeship programs or something like that. Within a few years you are making a very decent wage, contrary to todays professional, degree oriented market, where one might suffer 10.00 an hour jobs for the same amount of time just waiting for an opportunity to come along that is in the realm of their degree.
I had been toying with going to chiropractic school, where you need a BS in a hard science to get in (a problem, since I have a BA). I was talking it over with my old chiropractor (as in age, he was 78) and asked him what the requirements were for him when he went to school in 1954.
"Well, they frowned on it if you didn't have a high school diploma."
/facepalm
Although in fairness, chiropractors get significantly more education now than they did 60 years ago, and they are recognized as doctors by states and insurance firms. So I can see why the bar was raised. Still, that was alternately amusing and frustrating. I could never figure out why a chiropractor needed 4 college level courses in chemistry as a pre-requisite.
My Dad was a graphic designer who never went to high school at all.
During the depths of the Great Depression, he only made it to the 8th grade before he had to go to work to support his parents (who were both unwell) and five siblings.
By 1960 -- after years of toiling in factories and warehouses -- he landed a mailroom job at a major American banking corporation. He had always been an amateur artist and musician. His artistic skill caught the eye of people in the corporate art department. They offered him an entry level designer job.
By the end of the Sixties, he was promoted to Art Director. Fathered four kids. Bought a succession of ever-bigger houses. Retired comfortably with a pension during the 1980s.
All with an 8th grade education.
------------
I've heard many many stories like that. It seems like ability used to get you much further. That kind of thing just doesn't happen anymore.
Yeah, back in the 60s, if you were a white guy (and not everybody is, it's worth remembering), you could walk into a factory, join a union, and instantly have a middle class life. They would even pay you while they trained you. Workers got affordable health insurance, job security, pensions. It was a pretty sweet deal. I don't want to get too political, but what's happened since then is that the country has given up security in order to buy into the idea that everybody can be a millionaire. It's completely insane.
My landlord in Canada(in his 70s now) often told me about studying hard and in between those long lectures he'd say how back in his day people could just graduate high school and earn a living. Is this true? By that logic in the 80s a bachelors would have been enough to get a great job. But how is it even possible?
Let alone engineering or medicine related gigs, even something like being a curator would need something more than a high schoool diploma, or a teacher would require some more experience.
Was he just trying to scare me because it doesn't make any sense. I can understand the rise in competition and all that, but still.
There was an actual working class back then. You could make a whole career at the local factory, and support your whole family on your salary.
Most of those types of jobs are gone now. Either the products were rendered obsolete or the jobs were outsourced overseas.
My landlord in Canada(in his 70s now) often told me about studying hard and in between those long lectures he'd say how back in his day people could just graduate high school and earn a living. Is this true? By that logic in the 80s a bachelors would have been enough to get a great job. But how is it even possible?
Let alone engineering or medicine related gigs, even something like being a curator would need something more than a high schoool diploma, or a teacher would require some more experience.
Was he just trying to scare me because it doesn't make any sense. I can understand the rise in competition and all that, but still.
Back in the day, you didn't need to be a doctor or lawyer to earn a decent living. It seems like more emphasis was put on experience than education back then. People would work for the same company for 30 years starting at the "bottom" and working their way up through the ranks to a management position. Now days, they graduate people from college with an MBA degree who never worked a day in their life. Everything is theory in college. I personally think that actual experience beats theory any day.
Even when I graduated from high school in 1973 not everyone was expected to go to college. It has really been just the past 30 years that things have changed to the point that you really must have a college education to be taken seriously in today's job market.
20yrsinBranson
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
