“One of the biggest lies we love to believe is education equals success.” says Dale Partridge, an author of the Wall Street Journal. Every day, millions of students go to college wondering if it will all be worth it at the end. I believe there is little value in college because students will have to suffer the consequences of student loan debt and fight off all the psychological effects that are included with it.
To begin with, as the average cost of tuition is increasing every year, so is the average student loan debt. “Over 44 million Americans collectively hold nearly $1.5 trillion in student debt.” states Abigail Hess, a Careers Reporter for CNBC. With roughly one in four American adults still paying other their student debt, they are still struggling to pay it off even after they find a job. It is shown that student debt gets in the way of their financial goals, leaving many with little savings for their retirement. “The average student in the Class of 2016 has $37,172 in student loan debt” according to Zack Friedman, the founder and CEO of a personal finance comparison site. Nearly half of student loan borrowers have put aside buying a car because of their student loan debt, and many are limiting their spending because they can’t afford to overspend. Student loan debt is holding students back who want to save for a house, invest or open a business. For many, student loan debt is becoming a hindrance and is getting in the way of the spending and business engines that run the U.S.
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Secondly, college can lead students to depression and anxiety due to their student loan debt. “More than 74 percent of respondents reported shutting other people out of their lives due to their student loan debt stress.” stated Shannon Insler, a writer for Student Loan Hero, Business Insider, Huffington Post and others. People, now than ever, are isolating themselves because they don’t want others to know how broke they are, or because they are constantly working all the time to earn money to pay back the debt. For others, isolation is better than being vulnerable and devastated about what is going through their lives. “A 2013 survey of college students found that 57% of women and 40% of men reported experiencing episodes of ‘overwhelming anxiety’ in the past year” announced Gregg Henriques, Ph.D., a professor of psychology at James Madison University. Students are now starting to experience physical symptoms of their stress. Respondents describe their feelings as: overwhelming, horrible, frustrating, annoying, heavy, awful and hell. Many start to lose motivation as they are forced to battle their debt, along with their health.
Many believe that a college degree will guarantee you a good paying job. But the reality is that it is now harder for college graduates to even find a decent job. “There are many more students in colleges now than ever before. So that means that when your parents and/or grandparents applied to jobs out of school, there were only a few applicants for each job, whereas now there are thousands of applications for every entry level job.” says Erin Berkery-Rovner, a Career Advisor from Quora. Society tells students: go to school, get a degree, and then you get a job. They spend all their effort and money working toward this goal, with the promise that they were going to be given a good job. With companies getting thousands of job applications for positions, the likelihood of graduates getting accepted is very narrow. “Upon graduating they realized that this economic promise didn’t come to fruition so easily. Again, they did nothing wrong. The problem is in the framework and in the way our economic model incentivizes people.” announced a Quora Contributor on Forbes. With the economy largely controlled and depended on by companies, they decide whether they want to hire you or not. Companies simply operate to maximize profit and won’t think twice about firing employees or closing stores. If they don’t find an interest in your skills, then unfortunately… you’re out of luck.
To conclude, there is little value in college because of the thousands of dollars of debt people face and all the psychological effects that are caused by it. With society drilling our heads with the understanding that only education will lead us to success, we become incognizant of the other options. I encourage you to look into opening a business, investing or even making your YouTube channel, streaming on Twitch or even blogging. I remind you that the most successful people, such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Michael Dell, Henry Ford, Kim Kardashian and others, didn’t even graduate from college.