Does just having a degree actually make your life betteR?

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unfortunately, the same smarts that get one through the gauntlet of university are also needed to be successful in financial investing. one needs the income only the piece of filligreed paper [sometimes] enables for one, in order to have enough money to make any difference investing in the first place. it takes money to make money. it is a very steep and slippery climb, to win or even just get ahead] in this world, at least without cutting corners somewhere.

Not necessarily. Some types of investments are a little steep to invest in at first, like money market accounts, however treasury notes and bonds are able to be bought for $100 apiece. Stocks in companies vary in cost depending on the company. A simple investment, which is actually more of a hedge than an investment, would be purchasing precious metals like silver. Not everything is completely out of reach and when looking at a long term picture of considering adding debt of tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars versus incrementally investing in hundreds to thousands of dollars worth of actual investments I'd rather go with the choice where I have agencies paying me rather than having to pay agencies for the rest of my life.

Absolutely well said!

As for what Cyanide and zer0netgain said, here's me: recent PhD, Ivy League school, unemployed. Nonetheless I have no regrets getting that higher degree.

Do you owe money back or have you been paid in full through grants and scholarships? If you owe money back, would you mind stating the quantity owed?

Tuition and stipend both paid for by grants. Keep in mind, though, that graduate school works differently from undergrad education. Graduate school in the applied sciences is more like a work internship than it is classroom education. Factoring in the amount of time spent each week doing labwork, my stipend amounts to less than minimum wage.

Okay, so if you did not have complete coverage of your educational expenses covered by grant money, would you then consider student loans or would you have considered it too expensive if a great enough percentage of your college education was relegated to be financed via lending agencies?

Definitely the latter.

Interestingly enough, one prevailing thought that my undergrad profs told me about PhD programs in the sciences was that if you didn't get a full ride, then you don't go. This was ostensibly because if you had to pay with your own money, or with loans, then the grad school didn't really want you. So although I would pick the latter for your question, I honestly don't know how applicable it would be to my specific situation. Or the aforementioned percentage would be 0.1%.

I have a tendency to graduate amid really bad job markets. I finished my BA just after the 9/11 attacks, and my PhD just as the most recent recession was busy turning the employment outlook in my field into its best impression of a sucking vortex. On the other hand, I've always been able to land a job, and most recently, a career, in large part due to my experience and education. A degree is much like any other resource. It can help you get where you want to go, but you have to take advantage of it. It's not a guaranteed job.

I'm a firm believer that most college students would be better off dropping out of school and investing the money they now spend on college. Then take the four years they would have spent on college and travel, work, play, and spend time with smart people talking about important things. It would be your choice on what's important, not a professor, not a dean, not a faculty committee.

You don't have to go to college to be a success. Even if you go for awhile, you don't have to graduate to be a success. Here are just a few of the people who have become famous and/or successful without graduating from college and/or high school.

A survey conducted by Bloomberg in 2010 show that the school of hard knocks was the number one source (tied with the University of California) for CEOs of S&P 500 companies. Harvard was the #3 source (along with the universities of Texas, Missouri, and Wisconsin). The school of hard knocks features CEOs who never graduated from college.

Click here for a massive list of rich and/or famous and/or successful people who either never went to college or dropped out.

Yeah, just last year I was able to land jobs again too, just like I did throughout 2005 through 2006 even with having been fired at my last job. Heck, last year I was even offered a managerial position at a local restaurant. However, that's not a career but instead it's just making money in excess of my family's cost of living. But, out of curiosity, what were your majors and minors for your BA and in what field is your doctorate?

Its not guaranteed to make it better but chances are it definitely will.


High School diploma will only get you entry level and low skill,low pay jobs. You're stuck there. At best you'll be a supervisor or very low level manager. Its really rare for people with HS diplomas to go higher than that.

2 year degrees (Associates or Tech degrees) give you the chance to be paid rather decently but its in a very narrow field. That means if your job market crashes or becomes obsolete then your degree is worth zero when looking at other jobs.

Bachelor's degrees get your foot in the door to many good jobs and opportunities. They dont have to be related to your degree either. Most people with bachelors start in a company in entry level jobs and get promoted into what their degree is related to. Aka a marketing degree starts you off in the marketing dept. and can easily get you promoted up that dept. or into HR or Administration.

Master's degrees are where the real money is in. Once you have a masters and get a job in that field your earning potential skyrockets. Its a big change... most times you don't have to look for jobs since jobs look for YOU. Headhunters go for MA or higher degrees.

A college prof. once told me: Go up to your masters and stop there. PhD and Doctorates do not increase your pay that much compared to how much they cost and theres very few employment chances for those higher degrees since you literally have to wait for those people to die or retire to take those jobs...and it lowers your chances of getting hired to do the job a Masters degree would be hired for since your higher degree mandates they pay you more plus you're a big risk of quitting as soon as you land a job that pays more.

Of course this is degree-dependent and doesnt apply to all degrees (engineers and medical fields definitely will want a PhD or Doctorates).

Thanks for the explanation. Well, I guess I can't go wrong with certian degrees then.


What ever happened to America the land of equal opprotunity?

It got educated. When something loses value its because there's too many of the item out in the market.

So, in the future, no four year degree=homeless

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I think the biggest issues is quite frankly. No one is content with being a loser anymore. Like back in the old days people were content with it. These days, I don't believe anyone is.