Is a college education worth all the hassles?

[Evan Bedard]

Is a college education worth all the hassles?

As hundreds of thousands of young American enter the employment market with newly minted degrees, the clock begins to tick on those heavy student loans. The majority of student loans do not enter repayment until six months after graduation. Yet we are facing tectonic shifts in higher education.

The cost of going to college, seemingly the only path to what remains of the middle class, has far outstripped any sensible measure of inflation. As young graduates leave school many are saddled with tens of thousands of dollars in debt and the reality is, many are entering a lower wage workforce where pensions are a thing of the past, healthcare is largely shouldered by employees, and employment security is nearly nonexistent.

Keep in mind this is the market for recently minted graduates which are a small segment of our US population. There are countless horror stories of student debt including debt collectors going after parents of a deceased son. Welcome to college circa 2012.

Source: My Budget360

[corsaoceano]

I have asked myself this many times. For me it sometimes doesn't seem worth it. Especially recently when my boss said "I didn't even know you had a college degree." This is after almost 6 years of working at a mid level banking job where there are people in every level of management with no degree whatsoever making 2,3, or 4 times what I have been making. If you net the cost of my student debt out of my actual salary you get an even more dismal number.