As you said, degree holders are more likely to do better. The question is why and there are 2 obvious answers: 1) People who are already more likely to do wel

As you said, degree holders are more likely to do better. The question is why and there are 2 obvious answers: 1) People who are already more likely to do well tend to go to college. 2) Going to college prepares people to do well. I think both have a significant effect. Certainly in my own experience what I learned in college has benefited me in the workplace and almost none of what I learned (graduated in 2008) is out of date. When I look at my most respected peers, several of them don't have degrees, but those who don't either went to college and joined the work force before graduating or took more than 4 years to develop the skills and experience they needed to compete with college graduates. I'm not sure what kinds of individual traits you are talking about that are ignored by the sorting process or how this claim is supported by the few very high achievers that dropped out of college. I would expect some of the very high achievers to take the harder path of blazing their own trail.