Doctors? Yes. Teachers? Yes. Almost everyone else?

It's not a "waste of time," but it's not the financial investment many want you to believe it is.

Agreed.

I absolutely love being an RN :)

I quit school when I was 16 because they stopped teaching me what I needed to know. I got my GED and went to a community college and it turned my life around.

Today, because of the skills demanded by companies, most workers need at least a two year degree to even be considered for a position.

True story - I had a friend of mine who's time in the Marine Corps was coming up. He was getting the full court press from our Master Sergeant who was trying to get him to reenlist, so he told him that he was going to get out and do something serious with his life and go to clown college.

I read about that back in elementary school. Seriously, and you know I'm not a spring chicken. Back in '68, one of the Scholastic magazines did an article on the clown college. One of the students was a recently discharged marine. (I am not making this up) IIRC, he said something along the line of his ballet classes were tougher than USMC basic training. Before you ask why a clown needs to know ballet, it helps to be a little graceful when you do a pratfall, as well as choreographing a routine with a bunch of clowns

That's awesome. My incident took place in the mid 80s, but my friend was from the Sarasota area, where Clown College is (or was), so maybe he heard that story and wanted to replicate it? He never ended up going to Clown College, just wanted to get the MSgt off of his back.

In a related story, I just read that Ringling Bros is doing their last shows this weekend. Sad!

Yeah. It's a shame that the tradition came to an end. I don't know if you read Science Fiction (I'm a BIG fan) but about that time frame, a writer named Barry Longyear was doing short stories about the circus in the future. Similar storyline, where the last circus on Earth was on the brink of closing because of local and state ordinances that were in place due to cruelty to animals. The owner of the circus got an idea, and took it off world. (Sci Fi, remember) there were two collections: The City of Baraboo which tells about the last days the circus had on Earth and the early routes in space, and Circus World, which put these performers on a planet where they had to figure out how to keep traditions alive but survive at the same time. a pretty good read.

Awesome...yes, I do like sci-fi, so I'll have to look for that, thanks.

That circus sounds out of this world.

For the trades (car mechanic, plumber, welder, etc.), no, you don't really need college. For many other occupations, either to land a job in the first place or advance within the organization, you do. Where some people go wrong is going after a degree that has nothing to do with their prospective occupation. Sure, if you want to MINOR in transgender studies, basket weaving or something, have at it, but you'll be lucky, with whatever job you wind up getting, to even pay back the loan.