You should be able to live a good life without a degree

J.I moved to my area about 15 years ago to be closer to family, but I couldn’t find a job as an office manager, even though I had been one for years. She was an intelligent, articulate, middle-aged woman with brilliant references. But times have changed in the decade since she last looked for a job. She wasn’t even getting the opportunity to interview, as one potential employer told her: No bachelor’s degree, no interest.

The same has been happening to people all over the country seeking middle management jobs or in sales, customer service and support – jobs that have never required a four-year education before. Job requirements have not changed appreciably, but educational minimums have. Instead of looking for the most qualified and enthusiastic candidates, employers looked for “pieces of paper” – college degrees. It’s been bad for the economy, bad for workplace diversity, and bad for uplifting low-income families and populations. But only now are employers and the general public realizing that not everyone wants or should need a four-year college education to lead a good life.

What this so-called “degree inflation” means is that smart, qualified, good-looking people who didn’t follow the conventional college path after high school have been excluded from jobs they could have done well – which often means that people of color, who are less likely to attend college, are denied the opportunity for social mobility. Meanwhile, people with college degrees are often underemployed, taking jobs that don’t take advantage of their education. A decade after receiving their bachelor’s degree, 45% of bachelor’s graduates are working in jobs that don’t require college degree skills.

For decades, teens and families have heard this refrain: If you want to be someone, you need to get a degree. It’s the only way to make good money. Without it, you will be left out of 21^st global economy of the century. High schools were measured by the number of graduates who attended four-year schools, and many still do. But for many college students, the results have not been good. A third leave college without a degree – but often with a lot of student debt.

Read more: Many high school seniors are dropping out of college altogether

Antonio Santos is one of more than 100 people I interviewed for my book, Rethinking College: A Guide to Thriving Without a Degree. He attended college to become a video editor, but left when he found the instructions too strict. “I felt like my teachers kept stifling any creative ideas I had,” he told me. When he dropped out, he took with him $70,000 in student debt. Ultimately, he taught himself how to edit videos with the help of mentors he cultivated and now makes six figures doing what he loves.

Meanwhile, a shocking 45% of people with college degrees are underemployedtaking jobs that don’t require a bachelor’s degree. The bottom quarter of college graduates, in fact make less moneywhen adjusted for inflation, than two decades ago.

During the Great Recession, employers looking for higher quality employees turned to college graduates, of whom were plentiful. In essence, they were using a degree as a substitute for intelligence – which wasn’t very smart of them. Degree inflation is bad for business, according to a 2017 Harvard Business Review report. Managers pay more for college graduates, but end up finding that experienced employees without degrees perform just as well. Meanwhile, college graduates, seeing these jobs as inferior, leave early. Rapid staff turnover is expensive and time-consuming.

This does not make a college degree useless. On average, bachelor’s degree holders still make more money than the average high school or community college graduate and the number of good new jobs for them is predicted to grow. Typically, at least some post-secondary training is required to earn a living – and good jobs are also expected to grow in this sector.

But nearly 30% of people with a two-year associate’s degree actually earn more than the average four-year degree, according to a 2021 Georgetown University report. Imagine how many income disparities could be closed if employers opened more good jobs to people with less than a bachelor’s degree, in cases where that this really isn’t necessary.

That’s how things work in Switzerland. The university exists for students who succeed in a very rigorous high school curriculum and are moving into professions such as doctor, teacher or engineer. But those interested in the hospitality industry, technology, manufacturing, and other areas typically attend high school part-time for the last two years and work at a company. part-time paid learning in your field of choice. They could then train for another year or so before starting careers that in this country would require a bachelor’s degree or even a master’s degree. An expatriate in Switzerland told me that her husband, a longtime banking executive, decided to go to university only when he started working with American bankers, because she knew they wouldn’t respect him without a college degree. Hotel managers here generally need a bachelor’s degree; In Switzerland, apprenticeships and some extra training are sufficient.

The pendulum is beginning to swing in the United States, albeit too slowly. The pandemic has created a labor shortage; At the same time, the Black Lives Matter movement has caused employers to take hiring a diverse workforce more seriously.

Spurred on by nonprofits like Opportunity@Work, which pushes employers to hire based on skills rather than pedigree, more and more companies are opening jobs previously only to graduates to people who built their resumes through other types of training. Technology companies were among the first to abandon the requirements; In my book there are several programmers who learned through short-term programs, or in one case, a man who was self-taught and now makes close to $200,000 a year. The federal government and more than 20 states have bachelor requirements removed of public jobs that don’t really require a degree.

In Denver, philanthropist Noel Ginsburg started a white collar learning program in conjunction with some of the local high schools and businesses. One of the young women in this program grew up in a family so financially needy that she depended on free meals at school to eat well; by age 20, she was earning six figures and the only debt she had was the mortgage on her new home.

Large companies, especially in the insurance and business support sectors, have started their own apprenticeship programs through community colleges.

There is a legitimate fear that, in a world where skills are superior to degrees, schools will funnel black and Latino students into non-university careers. Our nation must continue working to make college more affordable and accessible for all students who desire a college education. Forget the “College is a scam” movement. Higher education is worthwhile for many students and should not be reduced, in our minds, to mere professional training. Intellectual pursuit enriches minds and society.

At the same time, college is not for everyone, just as it wasn’t for Santos. We can build more financially stable families if states create robust white-collar learning programs in public high schools and require school counselors to learn from and honor the many paths — not just skilled labor and the military, but creative fields , entrepreneurship, technology, management, sales, aviation and even some forms of volunteering – for a fulfilling career and life.