Less than 20 miles south of where I live at the foot of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado resides a guy who goes by the name Mr. Money Mustache (MMM). According to his blog, “Mr. Money Mustache is a family man living in the United States who retired from work, relatively wealthy, at about age 30. After several years of retirement, he noticed that his still-working peers were envious of his lifestyle. They were making more money than he ever had, yet they were somehow still broke. So he decided to write this blog to educate the world on how it is done.”
I recommend his blog to anyone who is interested in an alternative path that doesn’t involve a lifetime of acquiring things and working to pay off the debt. But today I want to highlight last Thursday’s post titled 50 Jobs over $50,000 — Without a Degree (Part 1).
MMM cites troubling letters he receives from college graduates who are struggling financially. He then asks the question that’s obvious yet off-limits in some quarters: “Why bother with a job that requires a degree at all, if it doesn’t pay accordingly?”
He adds:
In my current position of Man Without a Job, I have the rare privilege of circulating around the country and meeting many people, then hearing about what they do for a living. And what I have learned has blown my mind. While our parents always told us that you need a degree to get anywhere in the job market, the reality has been flipped on its head in the last two decades.
There are all sorts of people out there quietly making a mint, in occupations that I thought were either nonexistent or low-paying. Some of them have questionable skills and you could easily outperform them in their own job. And yet, many of the university-educated job seekers are stuck on the other side of this easy money divide.
Several years ago I had a conversation with a large research university president who also was responsible for a technology college that was under the legal umbrella of the university yet distinct in most respects. The president told me that, in the year just ended, the university-system graduates who were getting the highest paying jobs were the nuclear welders coming out of the technology college. After two years of postsecondary education and training, they were earning over $100,000.
I also recall that the job placement rate at the same technology college was somewhere over 95% — much higher than nearly all four-year colleges today. In fact, at some colleges fewer than 1 in 4 graduates has a job in their field when stepping off the commencement stage.
In an earlier post, I cited a Texas study that shows that graduates of certain technical programs at community colleges are out-earning their more highly educated counterparts at UT and other four-year schools.
Somewhere along the line America developed a strong bias in favor of white-collar jobs as well as the idea that college is the best option. It is the best option for certain students. It’s a terrible option for others.
MMM mentions various alternatives. There are many in addition to the ones he lists in his blog.
Some parents put a lot of pressure on their kids to go the traditional college route. Peers create pressure, too. It’s not always easy pursing a career path that others deem inferior.
I’ve known my share of college grads who spend their whole lives trying to dig out of a financial hole. And I’ve known my share who aren’t happy with their career or employment situation. There is something to be said for working for yourself and not spending your entire career working for someone else (or faceless shareholders).
A lot of small business owners who never went to a four-year college are doing just fine and are quite happy with their situation. Is it for everyone? Of course not. But don’t buy into the myth that it’s an inferior path.
Finding My College 