It's a joke among engineers that you need to graduate from college so that you can start learning. My college experience (non-technical bachelors) was just a joke, period - high school 2.0. Still, I wouldn't have the good job I do now if I hadn't completed my degree.

We keep running into this problem where employers think college degrees are more valuable than they probably are. Part of that is impressed culturally, but more than anything we lack better methods of certification in most jobs. We need certification that matters, is widely accepted, and that employers actually trust. It has to be marketed well, and it has to actually produce graduates with up-to-date skills. It's not easy, especially in fields where curriculum must change yearly.

Underlying all of this is a larger, unavoidable change taking place: the disappearance of unskilled work. Computers and machines are slowly taking over every unskilled job, starting at the least skilled and moving upwards to things we used to think of as skilled labor. Taxi drivers and factory workers will hardly exist in 10 years. Construction workers will only supervise machines in our lifetimes. Unless you want to work in a low-paying retail job for the rest of your life, you need to get a degree so you can work your way up some corporate ladder - or so the thinking goes.