The debt a lot of kids incur certainly sets them back. Even community colleges have absurd tuitions now. I studied biochem and computer science in college. The

The debt a lot of kids incur certainly sets them back. Even community colleges have absurd tuitions now. I studied biochem and computer science in college. The biochem parts I absolutely could not have learned at home without a lab and domain experts teaching me. The computer science bits, not so much. I was already programming by college and was doing capstone-level work in my freshman courses. I suspect this is true of many students who get started with learning their field in high school. I get the sense that for many degrees that are not hands on with labs and equipment, a university setting is unnecessary. None of my "connections" from university mattered. I made it much further by making my own outside of classes. So, at least anecdotally, I can't buy that argument either.