If you look at the conjunction of standards going down, and student loans effectively being government sanctioned predatory debt subsidized by taxpayer dollars, and "education" being a sacred cow in certain circles, then of course degree mills are going to be churning out more than ever before.
People aren't being educated, they're being credentialed, and you can no longer assume the quality of a credential. I will trust 100 of 100 people who can coherently explain a system or process over people purportedly credentialed for a thing.
It's far easier to make more money in trades, or to earn experience and work outside traditional career ladders with no degree. These days you can gain experience in technical domains and even without certifications or degrees you can get to the top 5% of paying jobs. Not all jobs, not everywhere, but it's very, very common to see experience exceptions. Prove you can do a thing, that you're good at a thing, and that matters far more than a degree.
The best you can assume from a degree is that a person has enough persistence to stick it out for 4 years on a singular goal. In rare instances, their capabilities are going to align well with the best of what their credentials imply, and they'll actually be exemplary.
Most of the time, in my experience, degrees are nothing more than attendance slips, these days. Congratulations, you're literate and showed up.
- The public school system now acts as though its only goal is college prep
- Above means that many of the kids most likely to excel at trades (i.e. the hard workers) go to college, because if you work hard at HS you will both get the credentials needed to get into college and be told it's the right path for you
- The kids who slacked at High School often also slack at the trades and switch to a minimum-ish wage job where they won't get fired for being on their phones for 50% of their clocked hours.
> - Above means that many of the kids most likely to excel at trades (i.e. the hard workers) go to college, because if you work hard at HS you will both get the credentials needed to get into college and be told it's the right path for you
Well, also that working in trades are long days that are hard on your body in a feast or famine industry. Vs being an engineer is easy on the body, barely 8 hours of work most days, and you get paid vacation, good health insurance, etc.
My dad is a career electrician who discouraged me from getting into the trades by hiring me as a teenager. He'd often point out that the engineers on job sites were paid more than both of us put together and they got to chill out in the A/C most of the time, and they came to the site later and left earlier than we did.
I do genuinely enjoy designing/building/fixing things. But the reality is, I'm much better off using my brain for work, and tinkering in the garage for fun. Anyone smart enough to be a great tradesperson is smart enough to do that calculus.
That's probably the real problem there; going into trades is pareto-suboptimal (for any combination of motivation and talent, you can get a better job)
and "degrees are nothing more than attendance slips"
What do you think a degree should be? I think because of selection effects, it's always been hard to figure out if universities actually do anything. Did the ivies educate people the best? Or did they just have the most rigorous admissions process to let the best people in. With an increase in the number of white collar workers, we've inherently had to lower the standards.
People aren't being educated, they're being credentialed, and you can no longer assume the quality of a credential. I will trust 100 of 100 people who can coherently explain a system or process over people purportedly credentialed for a thing.
It's far easier to make more money in trades, or to earn experience and work outside traditional career ladders with no degree. These days you can gain experience in technical domains and even without certifications or degrees you can get to the top 5% of paying jobs. Not all jobs, not everywhere, but it's very, very common to see experience exceptions. Prove you can do a thing, that you're good at a thing, and that matters far more than a degree.
The best you can assume from a degree is that a person has enough persistence to stick it out for 4 years on a singular goal. In rare instances, their capabilities are going to align well with the best of what their credentials imply, and they'll actually be exemplary.
Most of the time, in my experience, degrees are nothing more than attendance slips, these days. Congratulations, you're literate and showed up.