> In the Germanic world (Germany, Switzerland, Scandinavia) doing a degree is choosing a life path. You're an Electronic Engineer? Great, you can apply for jobs

> In the Germanic world (Germany, Switzerland, Scandinavia) doing a degree is choosing a life path. You're an Electronic Engineer? Great, you can apply for jobs in EE. Nobody else can. Not really. Unemployment among people with college degrees wouldn't be so low if hiring criteria were as strict as you intimate, and they aren't. For example, I have a Ph.D. in computer science and work at my university's math department. I know astrophysicists working in IT and at least one historian (by training) working as a journalist. Businesses will hire someone with a college education not necessarily because they need the specific subject-related skills that have been installed into them in college, but just as much because of the subject-independent skills they learn; this is also why a master's degree is still the gold standard: a bachelor's degree in many quarters is still seen as something that's too much like school where you receive knowledge rather than researching it, but neither conveys the practical skills of vocational training. Humboldt's ideal [1] has become more difficult to maintain in a world of ever expanding knowledge, but as an ideal, it still exists. The exceptions are occupations with very specialized requirements (such as law, medicine, or teaching) and the vocational system: it's actually one of the biggest drawbacks of the system, where changing careers (in a society where 90% have a credentialed education) can be a daunting perspective past your 20s, but where vocational training often being too specialized [2] may necessitate it. This is where the situation that you describe occurs far more often. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humboldt%27s_Ideal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humboldt%27s_Ideal [2] Vocational training has its own career paths and options to expand your skill sets, but that doesn't always work.