The reason is no longer true but it was true that corporations needed more educated workers to perform certain tasks and college graduates were relatively rare.

The reason is no longer true but it was true that corporations needed more educated workers to perform certain tasks and college graduates were relatively rare. Most of the college graduates in my parents' generation were gainfully employed consistently in my childhood. That is definitely not the case among my college educated peers today. Many are underemployed and in debt. Some of the issue is that people are chasing the economic signals from an age past where the conditions were just different.