Young Men in US Abandoning College Education at Record Rates (bloomberg.com)
- Reference: 0177125311
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/04/24/1811224/young-men-in-us-abandoning-college-education-at-record-rates
- Source link: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2025-04-21/why-american-men-think-it-s-not-worth-going-to-college-anymore
Financial concerns dominate decision-making, with even public in-state education costing approximately $25,000 annually. One high school senior secured a $15/hour collision repair job, Bloomberg reports, calculating he'll earn "upwards of a grand every other week" while avoiding student debt.
Social media significantly influences these choices. "You see a lot of influencers saying you don't need to go to college, and when people see that, they listen," explained one student from Perry High School.
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2025-04-21/why-american-men-think-it-s-not-worth-going-to-college-anymore
Broken clock (Score:2)
I'm not one to suggest anyone listen to an influencer, but they might actually be doing a public good here.
Backup plan (Score:1, Funny)
BACK IN THE DAYYYYY, lot of times guys would go to college so they had a back up plan in case their dream goes south. Now, you better make it cause that bill is going to be higher than giraffe vagina
Re: (Score:2)
Most of those people were athletes..or musicians...or thespians. Get your degree while playing football and if you blow your knee out senior year then you got your communications degree to fall back on. If the band doesn't make it at least you got that MBA.
I mean..I know a lot of people that went in to EE and stuff and just totally didn't make it...but they usually figured that out while in college.
That's still true for a lot of people; less so for sports since college sports has just become pro-lite.
Re: (Score:2)
Back in the dayyyy, colleges were there to serve the interests of the people. Now, they exist to serve the interests of the rich.
Guys seeing the AI writing on the wall (Score:2)
If your college-degree-requiring job will soon be done by a chatbot by just prompting it, why go into college and debt?
Re: Guys seeing the AI writing on the wall (Score:2)
For the free chatGPT and GROK for students to get them hooked early!
Costs (Score:1)
For various reason the cost figures are greatly exaggerated. To some degree people just don't want to go to college and are happy to cite exaggerated numbers, or they're gullible to what anti-college influencers are saying. An undergrad in California can still be done for under 40k, I talk to people who think they need to save $150,000+ plus for their kids education.
Re: (Score:3)
Are you including room and board? Texts? Equipment?
That sound like you might be right if your kid goes to a local college and continues living at home. Otherwise plan on over $24,000 for just room and board, a bit more for clothes, transportation, phone, and other expenses. (That rate is a bit less than what a Berkeley dorm would cost, so it can be done a bit cheaper, but not a whole bunch cheaper.)
Re: (Score:1)
No I'm not because you pay for housing regardless if you attend college or not. Why does it suddenly become a college related cost? For state schools that require dorming, remove that policy. But you can currently get around it by transfering in from junior college. Text cost are negligible for most majors, and what equipment; car, computer, clothes? Because you don't own those if you don't go to college? Mabye the bigger problem is the American culture where kids are expected to vacate at 18?
Yay! (Score:1)
Though sad in some ways to lose it, its having some great aspects, it's no longer really affordable. Good to see people smartening-up to that fact.
My Two Sons (Score:5, Insightful)
I have two sons. My older son is finishing his junior year of college and working part-time in his chosen field. My younger son went to a vocational high school for his final two years, where he learned HVAC, got his OSHA 20 hour card, and became certified to handle all manner of refrigeration systems. He's currently working as a residential HVAC installer and is one of the youngest employees in his company.
Both of my sons have found their niche, and I am very proud of both of them. Not everyone is cut out for college, and we need to understand and accept this.
Re: (Score:3)
Who doesn't understand that? The problem isn't that college has grown unaffordable for people who aren't suited to it, but that it's grown unaffordable for people who are.
When young people cannot justify a college education for any, we end up with an uneducated, incompetent society. We're all happy you think you've solved your YOU problem but you haven't. Lack of viable education is a problem for all of us, a strong middle class is what makes a country great, not a con man that spews lies and destroys ed
Who is going to buy your son's air conditioners? (Score:1)
We're collapsing the middle class. Your son is generally selling AC units to people who graduated college. That's because without a college degree in our current economy you're going to top out around 20 bucks an hour and you're going to be using a window unit.
You need ultra high productivity workers in the form of college graduates to support high-end service jobs like what your son with the HVAC cert is doing. It's not sustainable for us all to just be plumbers and HVAC installers.
Re: (Score:3)
Where did I say that NOBODY should go to college?
Where did I say that EVERYONE should be in the trades?
Yes, there is an issue with the high cost of post-secondary education, and it does need to be addressed. However, that's no reason to dismiss those who find their niche elsewhere.
I have one son who will be getting his Bachelor's in about a year. I have another son who is happily working in his chosen field who may or may not ever go to college.
Let's help our children be the best version of who they are i
Re: (Score:2)
Why don't you provide for them the rest of *their* lives? When did they sign a contract with you that you could stop providing for them when they were 18 (or whatever)?
Besides, when did your older son consent to have to compete for his parents resources, energy, time etc with a sibling?
The research doesn't help (Score:3)
I have been doing quite a bit of reading and am considered my district's best resource on this topic. Most of the research papers came out in the early 2010s'. Since then, they have been slowing.
The problem is what to do with the information. Several papers use throw-away lines like "use gender aware/specific pedagogies [teaching methods]." The problem is that there are almost no gender aware/specific pedagogies. The OECD has A, as in singular, paper on the issue, as it applies to male students, and literally hundreds of papers on the topic as it applies to female students.
When I have spoken on the topic, it gets a handwaving response and the sure to be said form of "well, we need to be doing something to help the girls." Then there is the implication that it is unmanly to seek, or provide help to boys. This is perpetuated and seen in the failure of young men to seek assistance in their college years.
I looked at working on this on my EdD, but there is a dearth of resources in the What to do about it" column.
Re: (Score:3)
Reminds me of a compilation of articles I wish I could find again, where a feminist researcher/journalist wrote an article with the title (paraphrasing) "Girls are surpassing boys in everything, including school, and that's a good thing!"
But then about 8 years later she wrote an article titled "My sons are failing in school and I don't know why!".
My own SO is an English teacher at the university level, and in her desire to improve her lesson plans, she reads many gender aware pedagogy papers. When asking he
He did the math w/o an education.in math. (Score:5, Insightful)
> One high school senior secured a $15/hour collision repair job, Bloomberg reports, calculating he'll earn "upwards of a grand every other week" while avoiding student debt.
In other words, about $500/week which is $26,000/year -- or $31,200 if he can work full-time. If he gets married and they have a kid they'll be just above the poverty level of $26,650 (for 3). Sure he's avoiding student debt, but he's probably also eligible for other financial that he wouldn't have to pay back and student loans don't have to be paid back until he graduates (or bails) and, depending on the degree, he could end up making a lot more.
All this should be based on his long-term interests, not simply making a quick buck and avoiding student debt. Maybe this will job will help him figure that out and decide one way or the other. If he's set on the non-college trade route, he might want to also consider electrician, plumber, etc... starting as an apprentice.
My experience is that the harder you work when you're younger, the easier things will be when your older.
Re: (Score:2)
> All this should be based on his long-term interests, not simply making a quick buck and avoiding student debt.
I suspect the people who don't plan long term and lack the intelligence to do something with a university degree overlap greatly. I still remember one of my highschool class mates rubbing it in our faces that he was earning $70k / year installing AC units out of school while we were struggling through university, and then graduated making only $60k / year. He was so smug having a 3 year financial headstart. Fast forward 2 decades and he's earning closer to $90k / year while the rest of us are clearing $250k
Re: (Score:2)
One can have a job in IT and still craft some things on one's own. I for one would be able to afford what I perceive as exaggerated prices for things like "tiling floors", but I enjoy to DIY such stuff, if only for the reason that it keeps me from falling victim to outrageous pricing.
They are preparing (Score:3)
When the 12 million "illegal immigrants" are deported, then they will have to pick fruit and vegetables and do shifts at Wendy's.
That is, if all the farmers didn't go bust because of the tariffs until then.
A lot of future cheap labor (Score:2)
Because without that piece of paper you have to be very lucky to get into the better paying jobs. Obviously, you find that out much, much later.
I'm impressed, actually (Score:2)
All these posts and so far nobody is blaming woke.
Been to a university lately? (Score:3, Informative)
> All these posts and so far nobody is blaming woke.
I will.
I used some GI Bill money for hopefully getting into a "big data" program, coursework towards a degree or certificate in dealing with large data sets as a matter of computation or statistical analysis. Once on campus "woke" permeated everything.
I had a computer science class where the first lesson was on reading some global warming propaganda on how computers were warming the planet, which was apparently intended to get the students thinking that if they didn't get their code optimized then they'd b
Re: (Score:1)
Content of the courses and standard campus fare aside, they probably didn't like you because you exude "asshole" and carry yourself like a cunt. But go ahead and assert "reverse racism" and how they obviously didn't like you for being a white man or some delusional pity party shit. You felt judged because you decided to tell yourself you were judged. A cunt is a cunt, it ain't because you're white.
Now, explain why acknowledging things that you don't personally believe as fact is somehow bad. All you list
Only old farts are surprised by this (Score:2)
In 2025, the average student is being told to take on a ton of debt to do this. Debt levels that we would have considered completely stupid and horrifying for an 18-22 year old. Levels that, 25 years ago, could have literally bought you most of a small house in much of the country.
Look at the job market, look at those numbers, and tell those young men they're stupid for preferring $15/hr with no debt to $25/hr with a lower interest rate credit card bill that large hanging over their heads for a degree that
College Got Too Big For Its Britches (Score:2, Insightful)
The cost of college has far exceeded the rate of inflation and at the same time, the competitive advantage college offers over local trades is rapidly diminishing. Either of these things is bad by itself, but together they largely negate the value of a college education. Why go six figures into debt and spend almost the rest of your life paying it off for a job that can often be offshored or possibly performed by an AI?
In addition to that, colleges have become environments that are increasingly less fr
Re: (Score:1, Troll)
> Men (and young people in general now) are more likely to be Republican while colleges keep pushing agendas further to the left
It is not the colleges. Republicans have no place in educational institutions; by their own choice they reject facts they don't like. Violently.
Re: (Score:3)
The cost of college is cheap. The cost of living near a quality 4-year brick-and-mortar university is expensive.
The University of California system, for example, has 256,000 students throughout 10 campuses including UCLA and Berkeley. All 10 campuses are designated "R1" (highest tier of research university). Tuition and fees to attend ANY UC campus is under $18,000/year for California residents. The cost of rent within a non-driving distance to any UC campus, however, will run about $800-$1500/month ($9,600
Re: (Score:2)
You don't need a college education to understand that the cost of living for everyone in California is high, regardless of whether or not that person is a student. Colleges exist outside of California and yet their tuition is still far more expensive than it is in most other civilized nations.
Re: College Got Too Big For Its Britches (Score:2)
you say that as if colleges, just decide what gets talked about on campus. as if they are some sort central master dictating who says what.
they are not. People are going to talk about what they are going to talk about. Sure the college can set certain regulations and rules, and they can have professors of every stripe who teach various ways and hold various viewpoints.
any group of people is going to eventually become an echo chamber. Being open to more than one side of things is difficult for any group be
Re: (Score:2)
It really got out of hand when colleges started implementing policies in which they declared themselves "safe spaces". At face value, it sounds great - colleges should be safe havens for exploring different political and philosophical beliefs. However, in practice it became a tool which could be weaponized to silence viewpoints that made some students feel "unsafe" (i.e. any viewpoint that deviated too far from their own). I initially laughed this off, because the real world isn't a safe space and these
Because they're smart. (Score:3)
The current mainstream narrative is that young US men are failing and that is reflected in their college attendance.
The exact opposite is true. Cost/Value has flipped entirely, no chance whatsoever in scoring a mate for life and a corporate career that lasts a lifetime for a simple degree to build and support a family. I wouldn't be attending college in the US either were I a regular young man today.
Trades. Full stop. (Score:2)
There has never been a better time to become a Skilled Craftsman in a given trade. You know, Electrician, Welder, Plumber, Carpenter, Mechanic, Landscaper, Blacksmith, etc. Decades of "The world needs ditch-diggers, too." derisive bullshit is biting society in the ass, via degradation of crucial infrastructure, and we're paying for it now. You don't need a college degree to make damn good money. You just need to be willing to get your hands dirty and fix the kind of problems people with college degrees will
Back to Medieval times is the red hat way (Score:2)
Saw so many "old times were better" stuff on social media during the campaign it was insane. Now pulling rug from under education and new message men are suppose to do everything and women stay home and have babies stuff of recent weeks. The red hats falling for this are thinking it thru. Get a blue collar job and wife quit her job going to be real hard to pay the bills in this terrible economy and add in now going to have to pay for a decent education for your kids. It's not the 1950's any more.
They're not abandoning it (Score:2, Insightful)
They're running out of money.
So the workload in college is has increased drastically. I put a kid through about God going on 8 years ago and their workload was about twice what mine was.
Businesses got tired of having to train employees so they went to the colleges, paid to build a couple of buildings, and then in exchange for that the college is added a shitload of on the job training ( that you pay for by the way ) on top of all the Gen Ed stuff you were already doing. They also added a bunch of ne
collision repair is an trade job more TECH jobs ne (Score:2)
collision repair is an trade job more TECH jobs need to go to trades and not college
American women will... (Score:1)
American women will have even more certainty that their husband/partner is beneath them and will become even more bitter and unhappy with their lives. But they'll still want their uneducated man to help pay down their student loans!
More opportunities for old men (Score:2)
All I hear is that companies will still be seeking my services when I'm in my 60's and possibly 70's. Which is nice, because the retirement game didn't work out for my generation very well.
YouTube aside, they're not wrong... (Score:2)
Historically, college wasn't a place everyone strived to attend. It was only a path necessary for specific career interests. Eventually, schools started pushing more of a "liberal arts" agenda, insisting that it made people well rounded and more employable.
From my experience, the late 20th. century through the present consisted of a whole lot of youth going to college primarily because of pressure from family and friends. I knew my share of friends who graduated high school and went on to college partially
We have plenty of graduates already (Score:2, Insightful)
Im fact we have too many college graduates. What we need are more ditch diggers, fry chefs and car washers. These young bucks will fill that need.
Re:We have plenty of graduates already (Score:5, Insightful)
Too many for what purpose?
Seems pretty clear that if we want a well-informed citizenry, we've got too few. I'd be perfectly happy to deal with a few undug ditches if it meant fewer of my fellow Americans had their heads up their asses.
Re: (Score:2)
> Too many for what purpose? Seems pretty clear that if we want a well-informed citizenry, we've got too few. I'd be perfectly happy to deal with a few undug ditches if it meant fewer of my fellow Americans had their heads up their asses.
We should have normal education at least getting us to literacy and decent critical thinking, yes, public education, but we don't. It shouldn't require payment plans to become a functional, literate adult in any society claiming to care about the citizens. History as something more than a nationalism screed, mathematics, reading/writing, and basic science should *NOT* require a college degree. I'm not saying that degrees won't help in all those fields, and I'd be all for it for more people, but right now it
Re: We have plenty of graduates already (Score:3)
This. Plus universities are not doing a great job of preparing well rounded literate individuals either - they were designed to support a well rounded individual to pursue higher education. That requires a very different degree of freedom than foundational education.
University coursework can try to compensate for the "literate" part, but they can hardly teach the "well rounded" part without becoming a different type of institution, and typically a worse university.
Re: (Score:2)
> Too many for what purpose?
> Seems pretty clear that if we want a well-informed citizenry, we've got too few. I'd be perfectly happy to deal with a few undug ditches if it meant fewer of my fellow Americans had their heads up their asses.
Since when does "well informed" require college? I know mechanics and plumbers that are arguably better informed (and read ) than other people I've met with a bachelors degree.
Re:We have plenty of graduates already (Score:4, Insightful)
>> Too many for what purpose?
>> Seems pretty clear that if we want a well-informed citizenry, we've got too few. I'd be perfectly happy to deal with a few undug ditches if it meant fewer of my fellow Americans had their heads up their asses.
> Since when does "well informed" require college? I know mechanics and plumbers that are arguably better informed (and read ) than other people I've met with a bachelors degree.
Judging by the levels of college vs non-college political support for the anti-science, anti-education, anti-expertise, anti-knowledge administration... it apparently being informed does require college.
Re: (Score:1)
Nobody claimed that being well-informed REQUIRES college. That's a straw man.
The existence of well-informed non-graduates does not mean that colleges don't help produce more well-informed people. That's cherry-picking.
Two logical fallacies in one post arguing against college turned into a pretty good argument in favor of more college.
Re: (Score:3)
> Im fact we have too many college graduates. What we need are more ditch diggers,
Nobody digs ditches by hand anymore. We use backhoes. What used to take a crew of five men all day to do, a backhoe does in an hour.
> fry chefs
There are only so many jobs in fast food.
> and car washers.
Most car washes are automated these days. The last time I went to a car wash, the personnel operating it was zero: it was completely unattended.
Re: (Score:2)
> He always said that she could dig as much in a day as a hundred men could dig in a week, but he had never been quite sure that this was true.
Notably, that's from Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel. Notably it's a technology that became obsolete around a century ago. Modern excavation equipment is a lot better. Also, more specialized. Trenchers are a lot faster than backhoes for digging ditches, for example. At the low end, they are at least 50X faster than a single human with a shovel. At the higher end, more like 300X faster than a single human with a shovel. A backhoe is about a quarter as fast, but that still puts them in the range where they
Re: We have plenty of graduates already (Score:2)
Don't forget brave cannon fodder. Only way to win a land war with China and help the Chinese Nationalist win their civil war that started back in the 1930's!
Classic Blunders (Score:5, Funny)
> Only way to win a land war with China
That's one of the classic blunders: you never get involved in a land war in Asia. Carry on like this and soon you'll be wanting to send them up against Sicilians when death is on the line.
Re: (Score:2)
> That's one of the classic blunders: you never get involved in a land war in Asia. Carry on like this and soon you'll be wanting to send them up against Sicilians when death is on the line.
Inconceivable.
Re: (Score:2)
Truly you have a dizzying intellect.
Re: We have plenty of graduates already (Score:1)
And apparently a degree is not what will get you hired, a presidential pardon if you screw up, or a cabinet position, or common sense....
Re:We have plenty of graduates already (Score:5, Insightful)
You think people should work a trade instead of getting a college degree?
Then bring back unions so that working class jobs offer equitable pay. Instead of management looking for ways to trim payroll and put the profits into the hands of shareholders.
Globalization and the race to the bottom has altered the mid-20th century concept of what a reliable job looks like in America.
> These young bucks will fill that need.
A lot of them are in their 20's and 30's. They're a lost generation to be honest. And after consuming toxic garbage from the manosphere, many of them aren't going to want to take a job that they consider low status. They somehow have convinced themselves that it's better to not work at all than be tainted by a job that a hypothetical women would not respect.
Really the only way out of delusional thinking is professional help. We need cult de-programmers and therapy for 50 million American men.
Re: (Score:2)
"Then bring back unions so that working class jobs offer equitable pay."
Um, what do ya think trade unions are? Management. ps - they are not to be brought back, they are still here.
IBEW, UA, NABTU, TAUC, UBC, they bid on providing labor for projects, like new construction, retrofits, overhauls, remodeling, residential developments, commercial, or industrial. They are the actual employer in most cases, providing training, benefits, negotiated wages. Not a criticism, just clarification.
They offer fairly conve
Re: We have plenty of graduates already (Score:2)
Sure, keep replacing male heroes in tv and movies and games with women. Keep funding programs for men to join college and keep pushing for more women. Keep trying to pretend like the dynamics of relationships between genders hasnâ(TM)t changed massively in favor of self-absorbed women. Iâ(TM)m sure what those men need is âoereprogrammingâ.
Re: (Score:2)
> Im fact we have too many college graduates. What we need are more ditch diggers, fry chefs and car washers. These young bucks will fill that need.
Not sure if you're being sarcastic or not. Symptom of the modern world I suppose.
In any case fry chefs are almost certainly going to be largely replaced by automated systems in the near future. I mean, they take a measured quantity of fries, put them in a basket, put the basket in some boiling oil for a set time, then probably shake them once, put them in for another set time, take out the basket, shake off excess oil, dump the fries into a container for fries, sprinkle salt, then scoop them up with a measu
Re: of course they will never laid when (Score:2)
Maybe YOU wouldn't. Perhaps your only good quality is your paycheck. Other people rely on more varied skills to mate.
Re: (Score:2)
however you lot are always complaining the women only want their education equals or above and the fat wallet to go with it,
Ahahahaha ... Seriously? (Score:2)
As if US college today is a surefire way to score a mate for life as it was back in the 1960ies. LOL!
You have waaay better chances getting laid by going to the gym, learning a trade, doing yoga, going kitesurfing, traveling on a motorbike and learning social dancing than by breaking your back (and bank) by getting some college degree that isn't even worth the hassle and investment anymore. It's way more fun, way more future-safe, way better for your mental, emotional and physical health and way better at en
Re: (Score:2)
> As if US college today is a surefire way to score a mate for life as it was back in the 1960ies. LOL!
With the female:male ratio in colleges currently standing at 1.37:1, actually going to college looks like a good bet to score a mate... if you're a man.
> You have waaay better chances getting laid by going to the gym,
Ha, maybe if you're going for the dancerobics or jazzercize classes.
Re: (Score:2)
So long as you don't offend your date and end up expelled. Without due process.
College is a dating minefield. Or so I am told by the combatants.
Re: Ahahahaha ... Seriously? (Score:3)
Love is a battlefield. They said it in the 80s. If you canâ(TM)t go to college and manage, then I guess you have a lot of growing up to do: Tough T. Learn you some manners and social acumen to weed out the crazies.
Re: (Score:2)
> As if US college today is a surefire way to score a mate for life as it was back in the 1960ies.
[1]https://scholar.harvard.edu/fi... [harvard.edu]
"In 1960, there were 1.60 males for every female graduating from a U.S. four-year college and 1.55 males for every female undergraduate"
Only if said mate for life was another man.
[1] https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/lkatz/files/gkk_jep.20.4.133.pdf
Re: (Score:2)
The educated people starting businesses are going to wipe the floor with those who didn't go to school. They will just have to go to college outside the US now that the US college educational system is shutting down / becoming government propaganda.
Re: Forget College (Score:5, Insightful)
"more manufacturing coming back to the U.S."
This remains to be seen. Trump doesn't have the follow-through necessary to actually change the dynamic between the U.S. and China. He's already back stepping from tariffs. What American company would start onshoring in such a chaotic environment? They're better off doubling down on overseas investments.
Re: (Score:2)
The issue with China is that you don't own your business there, you are leasing it from CCP and they reserve the right to not renew at any time.
Re: Forget College (Score:2)
The benefit of leasing is not owning non-strategic asset is more flexible, and if there is supply and no artificial incentives its not necessarily more expensive n the long term.
Most businesses lease most of their assets and its not because they are stupid with their financial decisions. They know they are far more likely to terminate their lease for a cheaper supplier than have their supplier refuse to renew a lease because of... personal animosity?
If you have limited suppliers you want to diversify, and f
Re: (Score:2)
Not to mention much of modern manufacturing requires extremely well educated engineers of several types, data analytics, etc to be built up, managed, and maintained. If we dont have the educated workforce for that bringing more of our outsourced manufacturing to the US is a DOA proposal
Re: (Score:2)
To get manufacturing back to the USA properly, if I recall the graph from an economist, you'd have to slash executive pay to the bone and lower dividends at some companies. That way employees make a decent (not glorious) wage and have benefits. The costs get even better if health insurance is automatic and independent of the employer.
A big chunk of money is shoveled into a few pockets in America. So while it's possible to build cars cheaper in China (or Mexico) due to lower labor costs much of that vanis
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
it's nothing more than IndoctrinateU any more. Go into the Trades!
Which is *obviously* free of indoctrination, you can tell just by the post's opposition to the very idea of indoctrination.
Re: (Score:3)
> Forget College - it costs way to much and it's nothing more than IndoctrinateU any more.
Sure, all that time spent studying History, ancient Greek Philosophy, or Economics, to name a few, is just a waste of time. We don't need anybody doing that just in case they come out of there thinking things they didn't think before they went in there.
Calling broadening your knowledge base and being given the tools and skills to consider other perspectives "indoctrination" is terribly ironic.
No argument that it costs too much though. And trades are good.
Re: (Score:3)
> Especially with more manufacturing coming back to the U.S.. It's going to happen, it needs to happen unless we want to give up our country and become part of China.
So where are these factory jobs that pay enough to support a family in 2025?
Re: (Score:2)
Don't go to college, it's government indoctrination. Go to trade school, where you can learn a trade according to government enforced code books and safety standards.
Re: (Score:2)
where you can learn a trade according to government enforced code books and safety standards.
Not for long. Those pesky codes and safety standards just get in the way. Once they're gone things will get done faster. If a few people have to be injured or die, well, that's the price to pay for progress.
Re: (Score:2)
> Go into the Trades! We need more kids educated and trained in the trades. They can make a living right out of high school in jobs that are desperately needed. Especially with more manufacturing coming back to the U.S.. It's going to happen, it needs to happen unless we want to give up our country and become part of China.
Where you'd be very strongly encouraged to get a higher education in science/tech or go into the trades. I highly recommend the NOVA episode "Inside China's Tech Boom" (s50e16), which focuses on Huawei, the nation-wide 5G build out and how they need both people with degrees and trade skills to support that.
Re: (Score:1)
> Forget College - it costs way to much and it's nothing more than IndoctrinateU any more. Go into the Trades! We need more kids educated and trained in the trades. They can make a living right out of high school in jobs that are desperately needed. Especially with more manufacturing coming back to the U.S.. It's going to happen, it needs to happen unless we want to give up our country and become part of China.
Both of these angles I think are true.
The indoctrination crap has gotten way out of hand, and I see it firsthand when I go on-site with my institutional customers (this land is on the former homeland of the bs tribe, we embrace diversity without really doing so, women are exactly the same as men). Unlikely to be appealing to the majority of men.
Even if tons of real manufacturing does not come back to the USA, who do you all think has to install and build things. It sure is not the homeowner anymore no
Trump's own commerce Secretary (Score:2)
Admitted on Fox News the jobs weren't coming back because the factories would be automated.
You can have the factories and you can have the poisoned groundwater that comes with them but you can't have the jobs.
I guess we can make you a slave if you're okay with that. There are guys in India that makes satellite dishes by hand because they are working in an incredibly dangerous conditions and paid just barely enough for just barely enough food to make the next satellite dish. And if they get too uppity
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I'm sure with attitudes and stereotyping like that, we'll have marriages of equals becoming the norm in no time.
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Marriage brings with it very high risk of divorce. And, in America, divorce courts are extremely biased against men. A bad divorce can leave a formerly-wealthy man living in poverty as an indentured servant for the rest of his life (and with no access to his kids). It's an outrageously unequal situation and one that no rational man would enter into.
If you want to see an increase in marriages of equals, we are going to need to repair the very unequal handling of divorce that is outright abusive of men.
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"Smart men don't get married."
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There's actually surgery you can get to increase your height.
But with AI, we may find the trades paying more than college degrees soon.
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"There's actually surgery you can get to increase your height."
But if you could afford it, you wouldn't need it. Vanity is a bitch.
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Considering labor shortage in trades and outsourcing + H1B + AI pressures on office work, I am not sure that a degree confers status. Which young 25 year old man would be higher status - 100K/year business owner-operator with zero debt, a truck and a large rural house or 60k/year office worked with 100K debt and a small urban rental apartment?
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You'd be taking on debt to start a business in most cases, too, though, and if you're running your business in the rural areas then it's likely going to be something with a very high debt factor like farming. There's nothing wrong with being a farmer, but you'd probably have a better work life balance as an electrician in an urban area.
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The one who is happier and more confident would be higher-status, at least IMO.
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> We live in a society where women only practice hypergamy. They generally only marry men with an equal or preferably higher income and status than themselves. They're also going to university at higher and higher rates. If you want to date women, you need to have a high end degree and a good paying job. And be 6 feet tall, but there's nothing you can do about that.
Counter point. I met my wife in the summer of 1985 when I was 22 and she was 41 (and recently separated from her second husband). I was still working on my BSCS (paying for it w/two jobs at school and financial aid) and she was a HS English (later Gifted Education) teacher with a BS and MS in English. For our first 10 years together she made more money than I did. We we're both 5'6". We were together for 20.5 years, married for 16 years and 3 weeks -- longer than her first two marriages combined. The
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Counter-counterpoint. That was 40 years ago. The dating landscape in 2025 looks absolutely nothing like it did in 2005, let alone 1985. Dating apps, social media, and 40 years of some of the most rapid social changes in human history make stories like yours interesting, but rare and almost completely irrelevant today. You were lucky to find love when you did (and I'm genuinely sorry for your loss), but that isn't the way the world works anymore and I'm afraid it never will work that way again. That doe
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Thank you and I get it. I haven't dated anyone since my wife died and your points are some of the things I dread going forward. (*sigh*)
Ignore the incel bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
Be a decent human that acts respectfully towards others, don't listen to idiot shitbags on youtube, actually listen to your partner, and you'll find a partner.
This isn't difficult. Anyone listing "scientific" reasons why not is trying to sell you what they desperately want to believe themselves, rather than recognizing that the answer is not to be a miserable asshole.
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In the age of social media women are looking at movie stars and models as their dating pool. They use money from their OnlyFans subs to go travel to these dates, and have been flown out on private jets by business owners as well. A degree and a high paying job still mean you are a loser.
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Na, you just need a rich dad.
youtube loser (Score:5, Insightful)
> "You see a lot of influencers saying you don't need to go to college, and when people see that, they listen," explained one student from Perry High School.
If you're making life decisions based on what some loser says on youtube...
Re:youtube loser (Score:5, Interesting)
> If you're making life decisions based on what some loser says on youtube...
Arguably, they're listening to what some winner says on YouTube. Nobody ever hears from the real losers because they don't have a following.
What most of the people basing their life decisions on what an influencer says fail to understand, though, is the concept of survivorship bias and that they are far, far more likely to end up as losers.
=Smidge=
Re:youtube loser (Score:5, Insightful)
"Arguably, they're listening to what some winner says on YouTube."
You hit the nail on the head. Who, exactly, are kids supposed to listen to if not the successful (At least outwardly) people?
Sadly, parents are often lost themselves when it comes to career plans and choices. If your parents are of the successful kind, then listening to them is a good choice. Plus, they're probably setting you up to have a cushioned safety net for your eventual failure, and the possibility of bouncing back from failure is the biggest contributor to success anyway.
If your parents aren't the successful kind, then whose advice are you supposed to listen to, really? There might be lessons to be learned from their failures, but the world is moving so fast that their own future prospects are alien to them, let alone their children's future. Teachers and school councilors are probably also off the list since they're just regular people living regular paycheck-people lives, which is seen as a failure today anyway.
The guy sitting in front of a camera spewing bullshit for a living is arguably the most successful person in the kid's life.
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you misspelled whiner .
Re:youtube loser (Score:4, Insightful)
So I went to college. Not because I wanted an education but because my dad said you want to hang around with smart, motivated people.
He was so fucking right.
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>> "You see a lot of influencers saying you don't need to go to college, and when people see that, they listen," explained one student from Perry High School.
> If you're making life decisions based on what some loser says on youtube...
Also, I imagine those "influencers" work harder/more than it appears in their posts for the opportunities and I also imagine that very few of them are successful enough to make on their own, living the life they portray, w/o help from family, etc... (Although, what do I know?) Personally, if you're posting about your hobby or actual job and experience some online success from that, great I applaud that and wish you well, but not so much for people who are or want to be rich and famous just because they'
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making life decisions based on what some loser
says on youtube...
Still better than making decisions based on the malignant narcissists who fancy themselves "influencers" over on tiktok.