re: judging someones employment

I tend to go the other way and have more respect for people who worked from the ground up than those who earned a degree and started toward the top. I think success based on hard work and experience is a great thing. I don't look down on the successful, degree-holders of course, because I think that's great too. I honestly don't care which way my little ones choose to go, as long as they are making their own decisions and doing what they believe they are called to do.

My parents both work for the Government and get paid well and have worked themselves up from the bottom, without any kind of degree.

My kids already know that there back up plan is to get into mining lol since its a big thing here. My city is a mining city, the best place to get a job and with a simple common core or whatever its called you can work your way up pretty quickly and make tons.

I have more respect fo rthose that work their way up and come from nothing so to speak.

I work in a restaurant, and our most knowledgeable and successful managers have been the ones that have worked their way up. The managers that are hired on normally don't do as well. I don't necessarily think one or the other is better. I think it depends on what job you're doing.

I don't think either way about how people work their way up. My FIL has a GED and then later went to take some college courses and he is a CSM in the US Army. He worked his way up from the bottom.

I'm the opposite. I've got my BA and working on a combo MA/PhD. I will practically be at the highest level I can be if I get a government job. I could probably make more later on in the private sector, but I need the experience first.

Quoting khigh:" I don't think either way about how people work their way up. My FIL has a GED and then later went to ... [snip!] ... I can be if I get a government job. I could probably make more later on in the private sector, but I need the experience first."

A government job? I thought you hated the government.

Don't mean to be rude but the last place I ever imagined you working was in a government department.

Quoting The (super kinky) Master:" A government job? I thought you hated the government. Don't mean to be rude but the last place I ever imagined you working was in a government department."

I've been offered a historian position at the Smithsonian, an archivist position at the National Archives, and a foreign relations specialist at Langley. Those aren't jobs you pass up. With Anthropology, the money is in either Universities or the gov.

<blockquote><b>Quoting Zbornak:</b>" I actually think the opposite in some ways. I think a person has often achieved MORE by working their ... [snip!] ... just a BA... but I can tell you, the five years I was in school were basically fun and games compared to "the real world"."</blockquote>



I agree.

Also, college is no longer the guarantee ticket to a middle class lifestyle. There are so many unemployed college grads with thousands of debt or under employed college students working at McDonalds. Better to learn a highly needed trade like plumbing than a worthless degree in Women Studies.

Quoting The (super kinky) Master:" I know the title sucks but I couldn't think of a better one. Do you think that if someones does really ... [snip!] ... the same position im in now by doing a computer degree (igot in via previous experience). Is this the common way of thinking?"

No I think that's silly. The point of getting a degree is not to achieve something but to have more choices for employment. If you can get the job without the degree and save yourself tens of thousands of dollars then that's pretty awesome.

<blockquote><b>Quoting Back to Noob Status:</b>" <blockquote><b>Quoting Zbornak:</b>" I actually think the opposite in some ways. I ... [snip!] ... students working at McDonalds. Better to learn a highly needed trade like plumbing than a worthless degree in Women Studies."</blockquote>

Um, yeah. lol I have a double major in English and History, which without further education is quite useless. I've had my degree since 2005, and have never had a job that I couldn't have gotten without it. I also have a smurfload of bad debt.

When I was in hs we were encouraged to go to college, and assured that we would "figure out" what we wanted to do for a career after first year. Sounds simple enough, but that's certainly not what happened with me.

I will actually discourage my daughter from post secondary education unless she knows exactly what she wants to do with it for a career.

Quoting Zbornak:" <blockquote><b>Quoting Back to Noob Status:</b>" <blockquote><b>Quoting ... [snip!] ... discourage my daughter from post secondary education unless she knows exactly what she wants to do with it for a career."

Why would you discourage her from doing something that will give her more options?
Of course, guide her to degrees "that pay," but why discourage academic achievement when she is so young and impressionable?

Quoting TheNuge:" Why would you discourage her from doing something that will give her more options? Of course, guide ... [snip!] ... Of course, guide her to degrees "that pay," but why discourage academic achievement when she is so young and impressionable?"

Oh, I want to be clear, I'll only discourage her if she doesn't know what she's interested in and has no career goal in mind. I took this path myself and I feel it was a very poor choice.

Perhaps a better way of putting it would be that I will encourage her to take some time off after high school to work and consider her options. I wouldn't want to discourage academic achievement... I would want to discourage going into debt unless she would be able to pay it back someday.

Of course, in the end, I would support her in whatever she chooses. I mean, if she has a goal in mind of course I would encourage her to pursue it.

Hope this makes sense? Maybe it's unfair of me. Given my experience, it feels realistic.

I also want to add that I feel the debt I went into to attend university, and now cannot pay back, has severely limited my options.

I guess that's why having a career goal is so important to me. I don't want her to make the same mistakes I did.

What they say does not make any sense to me. It is good to have goals but the most important thing is you are happy. I don't care about social status and there was a time when I was doing financially well yet my happiest times was when I was just above poverty level. Set your own goals because it is your life and no one elses to live.