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Comment by Dalewyn | Hacker News Reader

>are saddles with 6 figure student debt ... and are lonely.

While I sympathize with the plights of younger generations, student debt and (mis)use of communication tools are not one of them.

Unlike wider problems such as cost of living/housing and geopolitics, student debt and communications are two things completely within your domain of control. You choose to take on debt in the six digits, you choose to use communication tools the way you do.

If you don't want crippling debt, don't take out that loan; college isn't the end-all-be-all in life. If the likes of Facebook/Twitter and Discord are making you miserable, just don't use them or change how you use them; life doesn't revolve around social media.

Hell, even buying a house is still within the realm of sensiblity if you look beyond the metropolitan areas.

There's more to life than permanently connected city life stemming from a college degree.

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Yes, and if you are worried about lead fuel in additives just live in the woods. No one said you have to live in a city…

Not to live in the manner that is normalized for you takes extraordinary strength and is not a reasonable expectation. It’s possible, but let’s not pretend it’s a free choice or dismiss the power of the dominant narratives.

> If you don't want crippling debt, don't take out that loan;

Easy to say as a full grown adult, not so much for the 18 year old whose parents would flip a table if they decided to not go to college.

My parents excommunicated me for not going down the path they laid out for me which included college. Whatever.

Instead I moved out at 17, ended up homeless, kept going, started a few companies, got a few tech jobs, started another company, and ended up more financially successful than anyone in my extended family without crippling college debt.

Let parents flip tables. Only go to college if employers in your ideal profession strictly requires college, and only if you have a scholarship or the means to pay for it without debt.

>>> Instead I moved out at 17, ended up homeless

I hope you realize how bad of advice this is considering most people who start this path end at homeless and never move past it.

> Let parents flip tables. Only go to college if employers in your ideal profession strictly requires college, and only if you have a scholarship or the means to pay for it without debt.

I absolutely agree, with the caveat that somehow young people need to be prepped to have this attitude. Everything society stands for right now communicates the exact opposite values.

Check your stats: how many young homeless ended up successful in life.

There’s a lot of options between 6 figure loans and not going to college.

How do you pay for a house without the salary that comes from a white collar job that demands a college diploma?

There's something really ironic here about the anti-college crusade, the lastest line-in-the-sand drawn by anti-education propagandists. If the complainers knew enough about the benefits of college, they wouldn't knock it.

This is just the usual emotional rant about "Shouldn't have done it if you didn't want X".

Not their fault colleges are charging top-dollar and hedging bets against students looking for a better future. Not their fault the government got into the business of student loans. Not their fault the interest rate doubled in 2013 from 3.4% to 6.8%.

>permanently connected city life stemming from a college degree.

>If you don't want crippling debt, don't take out that loan;

>If the likes of Facebook/Twitter and Discord are making you miserable, just don't use them or change how you use them;

Just projecting a narrow view. There was literally nothing constructive here, and it's identical to every person who didn't go to college's argument we hear ran.

Bachelors degree holders have 3.5x lower poverty rate, and earn on average 22k more than the high school diploma would. https://www.aplu.org/our-work/4-policy-and-advocacy/publicuv...

But we get these unsolicited lectures from often-unqualified people who want to trash College hopes because of anecdotes of failure told to them by trustfund baby propagandists who went to ivy league schools.

Obtaining a college degree has benefits, some occupations even require them (eg: medical, legal), but ultimately it's a balancing act against the cost of getting that degree and how much you even want that degree.

If you really, really want that college degree because your life goal requires it and you have reasonably reliable plans for paying the costs of tuition, by all means go for it.

What I'm saying is that it's a terrible idea to go to college simply because "that's the norm" or you were compelled. Going to college is expensive, the decision should be throughly thought out.

There is more to life than going to college.

As for communication tools, I reiterate: If certain forms of communication are making you miserable, either change how you use them or just don't use them. Life doesn't revolve around nor require social media, anyone who has had any degree of real life experience can teach you that.

You use tools to enrich your life, if a tool isn't enriching your life then you stop using that tool.

> Bachelors degree holders have 3.5x lower poverty rate, and earn on average 22k more than the high school diploma would.

It’s fun how comparisons depend on what you compare. Now compare bachelors degree holders against people who have pursued specialized career training after high school: license electricians, nurses, etc

It’s not like skipping 4+ years of college and its associated debt doom someone to bussing tables. There are other paths that for a responsible individual can be much more lucrative and much more secure than slipping into four years of changing majors, gaining debt, and getting drunk.

University is important and should be universally available. But it shouldn’t be committed to by default.

> and earn on average 22k more than high school diploma would.

Let’s dig into that even a little and see what we get.

For starter they’re talking about on average. Just follow the reference in your article and you get to hear [0]. Look at how wide those range are for the college grads. 25% of college grads don’t earn more than the median (50% of) non-college grad.

If you happen to be one of those 25% college might not look like the slam sunk financial decision. And I’m willing to bet that what percentile you fall into isn’t random, but strongly correlated to major and college.

[0] https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market/ind...

I think there was a study that showed that college paid off only to a very low percentage of highest achievers, if you consider earning years lost, tuition cost and loan interest. And masters paid off to almost no one.

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