Higher education is in an insane bubble supplied by subsidized debt. Degree inflation have completely saturated the value proposition of a ROI through new access to job opportunities; same loan placed in an index fund outperforms your bachelor’s degree over a lifetime.

Academic bubble pops the moment the “get a degree, earn more money” narrative fails. It’s obviously inefficient; higher education is designed for academia, not career training—poor replacement for unserved STEM trade school niche.

“Academia”, especially STEM, has been diluted into a credential farm for the job market; universities are heavily profit incentivized to promote this. First undergrad, now masters standards have gotten pathetically low as a result. Grade inflation effects ivies harder than most.

Standards also so reduced due to taking on large influxes of foreign students w limited grasp of the language being taught in, again due to profit incentives. Academia’s become a corrupt joke, including all but most rigorous sciences—replication crisis effects nearly every field.

Internet has made audodidactism more accessible than any other time in history. University extremely inefficient in comparison. It used to be a funnel for all the smartest minds of the generation, now its a certainty you won’t find any—they will not waste their time in classrooms

Companies hiring smart young talent already ignore degrees. I’ve never been asked for my degrees in my life, and have never asked anyone I hire. Why? I’m sharp, and hire sharp people. Degree inflation is obvious, top schools graduate any common idiot. The market will adjust.

Only few reasons where college’s value proposition remains valid. One is networking, both with alum as well as professors—if youre in school, your entire focus should be on building a robust network as well as courting hands on time w good professors. Network is useless below ivy

Only education you’ll receive in uni is apprenticeship under a professor (esp true for maths) yet 99% students never once looked up their teacher’s papers. Unis not holding our best—network, but remember smartest not wasting time in school. Internet much more efficient networking

Other big value prop people bring up is essentially you get to party & fool around w girls hoping to land a STEMcel; for majority of college students, its an escape from dreary middle class suburbs & purview of their boomer parents. It’s called moving to a city & not being a dork

eg as a sharp young person, you will find far better opportunities and form a much better network couchsurfing San Francisco for a summer than you will 4 years at Stanford, let alone UCB. Also, self supporting a safety net has never been easier; remote NEET gig jobs are plentiful

Remember, college is a massive gov-propped up debt farm that extracts trillions in value from the youth every year & its primary secondary function is propaganda; most are coping bc they fell for an evidently false ROI thesis. But ignore this thread if you don’t have self agency

Real future of academia and schooling will belong to digital and physical learning networks, and glorified degree farms will be replaced by effective vocational schools. It’ll just take a decade or two before this fully matures. Read Ivan Illich

@CharlotteFang77 Did you graduate from college?

@CharlotteFang77 Doesn't a lack of a degree give companies an excuse to screw you over on your pay?

@CharlotteFang77 Do you have a degree?

@CharlotteFang77 if you are american and just wanna go for the experience or a vague unease at not having a degree, rather than a well thought out plan, perhaps study abroad its fun, you'll get a network of interesting ppl all over the world, virtually everywhere is cheaper than the us