Of course I haven't forgotten. But you can't ignore how its a national crisis. 1.5T and climbing (plus interest) because generations of preconcieved mentalities about "college". The notion that its a foundational entitlement to party hardy and pretend to be an adult while spinning your wheels studying nothing and repeating back indoctrination isn't worth one penny in tax dollars (direct or indirect), or anyone's individual funding other than the 26 year old child (lol) doing it. The sentimental memories you're clinging to cost you way less and that's largely the point. Medical school debt to get a worthless degree and ratings is insane. 6 figures for a degree in debt with a minor in entitlement will never offset a few years of partying.

Yes, the college debt market will bring the economy crashing down at some point in the future. College is simply not worth it, unless you are using it for a very high paying career, e.g. doctor, pilot, some engineers. Probably 95% of college degrees are completely worthless. Median wages in a trade now exceed the median wages for college grads by a notable margin.

Post statistics on average salaries for college grads verses high school grads. I don’t think a degree is worthless.

It's not worth it when you get 100k+ in loans in some inane degree field, but those people aren't the majority. The average student loan debt upon graduation is ~40k. That's still pretty ridiculous, but more manageable. People can still go to college very affordably. A lot of times you can earn college credits various ways in high school. Get your gen-ed classes knocked out in a year or two of community college. Go to a public, in-state university to finish off your degree. A lot of states offer scholarship programs for in-state resident students.

It's not really rocket science to not get into an insane amount of student loan debt. I don't know if it's a sense of entitlement, a lack of common sense, or just the inability to say no, but it's rarely cost-effective to go to your "favorite" school or the big name school in another state or your parent's school or a private school or a prestige institution. If you can afford to do that, great, more power to you, but most people can't and yet choose to do so anyways, hence the student loan crisis.

I've been dealing for many years now with doctors, lawyers, business people, etc, etc, and I've never once started my interactions with them by asking where they went to college. If they are competent and have the skills needed to do what I need, then I will use them. And people get that knowledge and those skills every day from community and in-state institutions that don't have to cost an arm and a leg.

According to the NCES https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cba.asp, College grads median salary is $51,800, and the median for high school grads is $32,000. However, the median salary for an electrician is $54,110. My friend from high school who didn't go to college, went military, now works as a controller, the median salary for ATC is $124,540.

Man... All these view points are insane, lol. It's awesome getting to hear all this stuff.

Thanks again everyone for all the advice. I know for a fact she has chosen the right career..... The question is what are the right decisions going that need to be made looking forward so when she looks back she did everything the right way the first time.

I'm envious of you all having earned such an admirable career.

Keep in mind that almost every time I see student loan debt quoted and a number given they are using only students who took out loans. They don’t average it out with students who got scholarships, grants, parent funding or worked their way through school. This skews the amount of debt for the average student far higher than it actually is. In addition certain fields like doctors and lawyers account for very high debt amounts but earnings compensate. That also skews numbers for your average graduate.

Even so, total US consumer debt and student debt as a subset of that is a substantial problem.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfri.../#20759ab97310

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/13/tota...-trillion.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...y_GDP_(nominal)

The Forbes article puts student loan debt at $1.5T while the cnbc article puts total US consumer debt at roughly $13T, making student loans 11% of total debt. The average student loan debt per student is somewhat misleading as you stated but the numbers are still staggering. To put those numbers in perspective; per the linked wiki, the IMF had China's GDP for 2018 at $13.5T and the GDP of Russia at $1.6T. I believe that the amount of consumer debt in the US is an impending global financial disaster which will make 2008 look like child's play.

Averages don't matter in individual situations here. You're putting engineers, surgeons, pilots, CEO's, nurses, military officers, etc side by side with unemployed HS drop outs, entry level job teens, military enlisted/warrant who make less, etc. But the benefits of the average don't apply to you just because you have a degree. There's also many who are making a good living with a degree but not because of it but in spite of it (heavy construction, small business owner, skilled in demand trade etc). They are helping to raise the average but that average still doesn't apply broadly to those simply getting a "degree".

Get a degree in gender poetry dance theatre theory with a minor in Marxist social justice engineering and journalistic propaganda and "graduate" with 6 figures in debt with a bad attitude and you simply won't be effected by the successful college graduates and what they're earning at all.

This is an oft repeated but socially dangerous out of context statistic that continues to lure teenagers and their parents (not to mention government) to throw unbelieveable amounts of money down the drain thinking they will magically benefit from the results of the average when they simply will not.