Most Millennials heard ‘the speech’ in high school. The one that happens during senior career day or an afternoon assembly at most high schools in America during which the school brings in some yahoo to ‘motivate’ students. Said ‘motivational speaker’ usually tells students that if they don’t go to college and get good grades they’ll end up living in a van down by the river.
Terrified that they’ll turn into losers with no real life accomplishments, many students head off to four-year colleges to get degrees and rack up an average of $29,400 of student loan debt. For students attending prestigious four-year universities, post-college debt can reach upward of $225,000 once living costs are factored in. Other recent high school grads either go to two-year community colleges and on to state universities to finish their degrees or attend for-profit trade schools. Some decide options like the military, which will pay for their degrees through the G.I. Bill, are the most affordable paths to obtaining a college degree.
Of course, there’s also those ‘slackers’ who think living in a van down by the river or in their childhood home doesn’t sound too shabby. Who needs to rack up college debt when you can work at the local Piggly Wiggly bagging groceries?
The prospect of life-long student loan debt may cause greater numbers of young people in America to do just that, writes Glenn Reynolds, a.k.a. Instapundit, in his latest book, “The New School.”
In “The New School,” Reynolds suggests that America may see a “resurgence of slacker culture” because the appeal of cheap living will outweigh the cost of college for young Americans.
Advisors, mentors, parents and society as a whole would likely argue that attending college and getting a degree is move valuable in the long run than taking a minimum wage job as a barista at a coffee shop. Just last week, Pew Research Center released a report that found the median annual salary for Millennials with a bachelor’s degree in 2012 was $45,500 compared to $28,000 for Millennials who had only a high school degree. That makes for a $17,500 dollar difference – which is no small sum.
“I think that a lot of people really are going to rethink whether they choose to go to college if there’s still an eventful chance of being unemployed,” Reynolds, who is a professor of law at the University of Tennessee, told Red Alert in a recent phone interview.
The professor has a point. The Bureau of Labor and Statistics has found that throughout nearly the past two years, if not longer, more than 34 percent of 20-24-year olds without disabilities were unemployed.
In the past, it was nearly impossible to achieve upward mobility without attending college, which is much of the reason today’s youth hold obtaining higher education in high regard, Reynolds said in the interview.
“But now, when you see a lot of people who are working the same job as the slacker would, 40 percent of college kids wind up with a job that they could have got without a college degree,” he noted. “And if you’re going to be a barista at Starbucks anyways, you could be a barista at Starbucks with $150,000 of student loan debt, or barista at Starbucks without $150,000 of student loan debt. See, which one is better?”
The answer is becoming increasingly obvious.
