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The Economist had an article about 6 weeks ago that reached the opposite conclusion. It essentially found a comfortable middle class lifestyle was going to be

by DougN7 8y ago

The Economist had an article about 6 weeks ago that reached the opposite conclusion. It essentially found a comfortable middle class lifestyle was going to be hard to achieve without higher education now, compared with previous generations. Now, it wasn’t specifically looking at coders and Tim was, but the title doesn’t mention that.

jordache 8y ago
Andrew Yang 2020 pres candidate articulated the realities of college education extremely well in the world of automation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DMCsXq_mYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DMCsXq_mYw
jeffbax 8y ago
This is true due to the cost required, but how much of the cost is largely due to credential inflation? Much of the population would probably do better with trade training, but we've sold it to "everyone must get a 4 year degree" and it's likely doing a lot of harm to people who are better served learning on the job or in apprenticeships than college. I think it's a good argument to have. I'm hopeful that online education and more sensible thoughts toward future debt loads among prospective students will start to chip away at the absurd costs of higher education these days. The only way to do it though, is if people have options.
C1sc0cat 8y ago
That's true for all Associate Professional and Professional Jobs now. When I left School in the UK you could leave school at 16 with 4 or 5 O Levels - (Exams taken at 16) and get a Job in the Bank now its joining at 22 with a degree
- barry-cotter 8y ago
  I just searched bing for “banking apprenticeship U.K.” and the following banks have apprenticeship programmes; HSBC, Lloyds, UBS, Barclays, Goldman Sachs, Tesco. RBS and Santander also offer them according to this website. https://www.prospects.ac.uk/jobs-and-work-experience/job-sectors/accountancy-banking-and-finance/top-uk-banking-apprenticeships https://www.prospects.ac.uk/jobs-and-work-experience/job-sec...
  - C1sc0cat 8y ago
    Which require very good A levels to get into which would get you into a good Russell (Ivy) group uni. Asa opposed to in the past leaving school at 16 - in US terms this is not graduating from high school
jackhack 8y ago
Well, then the Economist is almost laughably wrong. This completely ignores the building and construction trades. In America, the average Millionaire drives a F150 pickup truck, not a Mercedes-Benz or BWW. (well documented in the book The Millionaire Next Door.) Don't discount the trades. Take the HVAC guy who just spent a morning putting in a heat pump at my neighbor's place for $6000. It was < $2000 worth of equipment (wholesale) and just he and a helper working under the house for a few hours. Let's be extraordinarily generous and subtract out half that for overhead (licensing, rent, van, advertising, insurance, taxes) and that's clearing $2k per day. $8000 per month. Owner's surely making more than the laborers, but let's just split down the middle. That's still roughly $45k per year for working 8 hrs per week. Yes, that's poverty in the coastal elite towns but a middle-class lifestyle in flyover country. Move up to doing two such jobs per week (or even three) and a very solid upper-class lifestyle is within reach. Get a couple crews working under you doing a couple of those jobs per day, and now you're talking about a high standard of living, indeed -- vacation home on the coast/mountains and luxury vacations. Another example: The guy who built my home is an Ivy-League MBA. After graduation he quickly discovered he couldn't tolerate sitting in a cubicle, so he turned the "side job" doing home renovations (used to help pay for his $250,000 degree) into a full-time profession. Now 20-years on, he has built hundreds of homes and is a millionaire many times over. By swinging a hammer.
- randcraw 8y ago
  The only trades who are millionaires are those who started a business that became successful and employ others, probably at least a dozen staff. That makes such folks no more likely than 1 in 12 (assuming their business lasts and they don't regress to the mean). That's not the average tradesman today, and likely to be even less frequent in the future. The average Joe Tradesman never makes no more than $50K per year and has to retire in his 50s because the hard physical work (and inadequate health care) has worn down his body and he can no longer keep pace with 25 year olds. That's not a winning career strategy, especially in a future in which the rise of product disposability and building with modular components will simplify and reduce demand for much of today's trade work.

by DougN7 8y ago

jordache 8y ago

Andrew Yang 2020 pres candidate articulated the realities of college education extremely well in the world of automation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DMCsXq_mYw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DMCsXq_mYw

jeffbax 8y ago

This is true due to the cost required, but how much of the cost is largely due to credential inflation? Much of the population would probably do better with trade training, but we've sold it to "everyone must get a 4 year degree" and it's likely doing a lot of harm to people who are better served learning on the job or in apprenticeships than college. I think it's a good argument to have. I'm hopeful that online education and more sensible thoughts toward future debt loads among prospective students will start to chip away at the absurd costs of higher education these days. The only way to do it though, is if people have options.

C1sc0cat 8y ago

That's true for all Associate Professional and Professional Jobs now. When I left School in the UK you could leave school at 16 with 4 or 5 O Levels - (Exams taken at 16) and get a Job in the Bank now its joining at 22 with a degree

barry-cotter 8y ago
I just searched bing for “banking apprenticeship U.K.” and the following banks have apprenticeship programmes; HSBC, Lloyds, UBS, Barclays, Goldman Sachs, Tesco. RBS and Santander also offer them according to this website. https://www.prospects.ac.uk/jobs-and-work-experience/job-sectors/accountancy-banking-and-finance/top-uk-banking-apprenticeships https://www.prospects.ac.uk/jobs-and-work-experience/job-sec...
- C1sc0cat 8y ago
  Which require very good A levels to get into which would get you into a good Russell (Ivy) group uni. Asa opposed to in the past leaving school at 16 - in US terms this is not graduating from high school

jackhack 8y ago

Well, then the Economist is almost laughably wrong. This completely ignores the building and construction trades. In America, the average Millionaire drives a F150 pickup truck, not a Mercedes-Benz or BWW. (well documented in the book The Millionaire Next Door.) Don't discount the trades. Take the HVAC guy who just spent a morning putting in a heat pump at my neighbor's place for $6000. It was < $2000 worth of equipment (wholesale) and just he and a helper working under the house for a few hours. Let's be extraordinarily generous and subtract out half that for overhead (licensing, rent, van, advertising, insurance, taxes) and that's clearing $2k per day. $8000 per month. Owner's surely making more than the laborers, but let's just split down the middle. That's still roughly $45k per year for working 8 hrs per week. Yes, that's poverty in the coastal elite towns but a middle-class lifestyle in flyover country. Move up to doing two such jobs per week (or even three) and a very solid upper-class lifestyle is within reach. Get a couple crews working under you doing a couple of those jobs per day, and now you're talking about a high standard of living, indeed -- vacation home on the coast/mountains and luxury vacations. Another example: The guy who built my home is an Ivy-League MBA. After graduation he quickly discovered he couldn't tolerate sitting in a cubicle, so he turned the "side job" doing home renovations (used to help pay for his $250,000 degree) into a full-time profession. Now 20-years on, he has built hundreds of homes and is a millionaire many times over. By swinging a hammer.

randcraw 8y ago
The only trades who are millionaires are those who started a business that became successful and employ others, probably at least a dozen staff. That makes such folks no more likely than 1 in 12 (assuming their business lasts and they don't regress to the mean). That's not the average tradesman today, and likely to be even less frequent in the future. The average Joe Tradesman never makes no more than $50K per year and has to retire in his 50s because the hard physical work (and inadequate health care) has worn down his body and he can no longer keep pace with 25 year olds. That's not a winning career strategy, especially in a future in which the rise of product disposability and building with modular components will simplify and reduce demand for much of today's trade work.