When one chooses to go to college, they are investing in their future career, but is college really worth the price? Once a young adult leaves high school, one has a choice to either go to college or to go into the workforce. When one is deciding which path they will take, they must look at both the benefits and disadvantages. The advantage to going straight into the workforce is being able to immediately start their profession of choice and do not have to pay college loans throughout their entire life.
However, the benefit of going to college is that careers that require a college degree are often high-paying and come with worker’s benefits. The disadvantage to going straight into the workforce is the fact that in today’s job market, there are not many high-paying jobs that do not require a degree. The disadvantage to going to college is brought upon because college tuition has doubled in the past ten years which makes college unaffordable without being overwhelmed by student loans for the rest of one’s life (Graff 179).
The differences between these two paths make the decision to go to college one of the most influential decisions of an individual’s entire life. Each of these paths have their advantages and disadvantages, but in the long run, going to college is more beneficial than going straight into the workforce. Even if one does not wish to attend a university, they should not be regarded as unintelligent in their field. This is often shown by waiters and waitresses when they multitask and learn how to work with other employees and then deal with customers and juggling their complicated orders (Graff 244).
It takes brilliance and the ability to work at a moment’s notice to be able to effectively multitask in a fast paced environment such as a diner. Even though it takes talent to be able to work in this type of environment, a job as a waitress is not high-paying, does not provide benefits for the individual such as health care, and is very competitive because many people without college degrees are fighting for the few jobs that do not require college education.
There are not enough jobs in today’s market to support the surplus of individuals without a college education causing there to be many citizens without jobs and unable to support their families. These downsides to not having a college degree is crucial and it is life altering because of the adverse effects on the individual’s lifestyle. Without a high-paying salary in today’s economy, many families struggle to pay bills and keep food on the table.
Having a college education is crucial for many individuals in the United States because jobs that do not require a college education are hard to come by and do not pay well. Overall, blue collar jobs require a set of skills that are learned from experience, but even with this experience, these jobs do not pay enough money in today’s weak economy. College provides many benefits to the students that are able to achieve a degree and go on into their field of study, but are all of the benefits worth the price of tuition?
With the cost of tuition so high, many high school graduates are not able to continue on to higher education because of their financial standing. This forces many students to look closely at the benefits and disadvantages of college. The advantages of college include, but are not limited to; communication and writing, leadership, analytical, and social skills. They achieve communication, writing and analytical skills because college makes students problem solve and in order to pass classes, students must learn how to communicate what they are thinking in a proper manner.
However, students also obtain social and leadership skills through meeting new people from different cultures and socializing with their peers. These advantages take real life application when the graduate goes to interviews and have to communicate with their future employer. Even though these advantages are amazing to bring to an interview, college also provides other opportunities such as internships which leads to individuals with college degrees having lower unemployment rates.
“The employment rate for young adults with some college was higher than the rate for those who had completed high school (63. percent), which was, in turn, higher than the employment rate for those young adults who had not finished high school (46. 6 percent)” (“Employment Rates… “). With all of these advantages and exceptional statistics, it is secure to say that the benefits of going to college outweigh the cost of tuition. At the age of eighteen, individuals are given a choice to either go to college or straight into the workforce, but going to college has more benefits. Even though blue collar jobs have real life application, those jobs are not high paying and make it hard to raise a family.
On the other hand, going to college collects a large sum of student loans, but with a high paying career student loans can be paid off through time and the individual can start saving money because they have a high paying job gained with the skills they learned in college such as communication. All in all, with today’s economy, a student that goes to college is much better off than an individual that goes into the workforce because the benefits one gains by going to college outweighs the cost of college tuition.
