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📚 The ticket to the middle class

When both sides of the political aisle and all ages of Americans like to bash on something, you know there’s good content *cracks knuckles*

Riddle me this, Batman — What is STILL the best ticket to the middle class (yes, it still exists!) for the average American?

Surprise surprise — going to college!

*going to lean heavily on economist Noah Smith’s post on college

🗞️ The headlines: look at this stupid story about “wokeism” or how a college or university did some weird-ass thing.

🌱 The reality: College is good.

Here’s what the evidence shows:

• Go to college — you’ll get more money: as shown above, you’re much more likely to earn way more money over your lifetime if you go to college than if you don’t — this “wage premium” only seems to be slightly decreasing

  • Remember, we’re talking about the numbers on average, not about your personal experience or some guy you know who didn’t go and it worked out for him. Obviously, outlier cases exist.

  • You’ll live a healthier life: I know the Natty Light bros and vape lords beg to differ, but it turns out that attending college tends to encourage living a healthier lifestyle. We also see correlations between those who are less educated and less healthy.

• You’ll learn how to communicate (better): in college, you learn a lot about how to communicate better in and out of the classroom and, in general, socialize better.

  • If you think about it in terms of how you develop socially, it’s usually the first time you go on your own to develop your identity.

  • And at what other point in your life will you get the chance to be around 1000s of people your age in one place for 4 years???

So why is college getting so much flack?

Here’s what I think:

• Slightly declining benefit:

  • The main reason people go to college is to make more money, but it looks like people are aware the benefit isn’t as good as it was, like for their parents and Boomers. The higher tuition costs for the last few decades may have been eating away at the wealth benefit for younger generations.

  • But costs have been falling since COVID as college attendance has been slowly declining for the last 15 years.

• Mental health: college students seem more distressed than the general population, maybe because of the stress of studies.

• Easy target: Colleges campuses are an easy target for media when it comes to culture wars — we all get those reels or TikToks of stupid student interviews that go viral.

• Too high of expectations: maybe we sent too many people to college and made them think it would solve all of their problems 🥴

So in conclusion, the majority of 4-year degree college graduates believe they benefitted from college (and they’re right!) — we should believe them!

Across the board, everyone has been doing much better economically the last ten years, especially lower-income people. The rise in wages of lower-income individuals may be what’s causing Americans to believe that you can scrap out a good living without going to college now.

I, personally, think —

• going to a public university (where you won’t incur tons of debt but still get a solid education) is a great way to get some more cash over your lifetime, learn valuable skills, and meet tons of people and friends.

• BUT, I may reconsider it if (1) you want to go to a college that would have you incur lots of debt, + (2) major in a humanities degree (many regret this decision after and make less money over their lifetime)

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Thanks for taking the Pack,

Zach

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Disclaimer: This is not financial advice or recommendation for any investment. The Content is for informational purposes only, you should not construe any such information or other material as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.