Earning over 150K without a College Degree

amother

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 12:08 am

I didn't read the whole thread. But yes there are plenty of people who make iver 150k without a college degree. There are also ppl who make much less with a degree. Both dh and I come from families where most did not go thru college. (Now son of my younger siblings are going and my father also went). Dh makes about 100k at his job and I make about 30k.
My mother makes at least double my father who went to college and had an accounting degree. My mother is in a field that it is not needed.
My mother comes from a big family. No one has gone to college and I know that at least 8 of them make nicely. (Think over 300k a year at least) and at least five of those 8 make much more.
personally I think college depends on what field you want to go into and how much if a business head you have.

dancingqueen

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 12:31 am

amother wrote:

Its not anti intellectualism. There are ppl who feel that college is very over-rated.
yes, you can get a good position, and a nice steady income G-d willing, but to really make it to the top has nothing to do with a degree.
Bill Gates was a h.s. dropout.
my fil made buckets of money with business sense - not a degree.
my dh is building up a business now, sans degree where really, the sky is the limit. And yes, we did need some start up capital, but nothing compared to what it would cost us to put him through 1 year of law or medical school.

You missed my point. I said going to college isn't all about gaining money making skills. Its about becoming a well rounded educated person and hopefully getting set up on a career path.

My dh went to college and grad school and does very well B"H. that doesnt mean you can't do well without college but IMO its a responsible thing to do and is generally a good idea for many people.

Btw bill gates and mark zuckerberg dropped out of harvard to create microsoft and facebook respectively. That doesn't mean that most people have the ability to create billion dollar companies.

Barbara

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 1:28 am

amother wrote:

Bill Gates is not a high school drop out. He attended Harvard, and did phenomenally well before he dropped out. Even in high school, though, he was programming at a relatively professional level, finding bugs in return for computer time. He took combinatorics as a sophomore at Harvard, and was finding solutions that senior level mathematicians had not discovered. So yes, if you're a mathematical genius like Gates, maybe college isn't going to teach you all that much.

Yes, some people who eschew college do well. On the whole , though, they don't do nearly as well as college grads.

Amongst millennials, the unemployment rate among high school grads is 12.8%, among college grads! it's 3.2%. 5.8% of college grads live in poverty, compared to 21.8% of high school grads. Median salary $45,500 vs. $28,800.

And studies show that the disparity between those with a college degree and those without is increasing.

There will always be a rare few who are successful without a degree. But they are a rare few.

amother

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 2:43 am

When it come's to the Orthodox Jewish community the studie's and the salaries are not really applicable.

a) The popular "degree" in yeshivish circles is special -ed does it really allow a woman to earn more then a woman who doesn't? Not anymore the market is pretty flooded, the same is for speach and the same is for social workers.

b) The averagre male graduate of BMG is a college grad, they got a BA in Talmudical studies. However does the degree have anything at all to do with thier line of work?
Sure if they are a Rebbi, a Rav, A Sofer, a Mashgiach Kashrus, or I guess a Yeshivah School Administrator.
However all of those are low paying jobs.

The one's who actually make money are usually in career's that have nothing to do with the "degree" that they earned I.e Real Estate, E-Commerce, Contracting, or Business Start up's.

c) The average salary that one can get from a degree is quite adequate to support a non-jewish person because,

1) There is a 50/50 chance of them getting married and staying married (per the current stat's). And usualy when they asses the potential earning power of a degree it's for the individual not whether the degree will alow said person to support a family with say 5 children.
2) The one's who do get married and settle witha family generally have fewer children then an orthodox jewish family and far fewer then chassidish/ or rw yeshivish families (and many MO families for the matter)
3) The average non-jewish family has the option of sending to PS which is free the average orthodox jewish family does not view that as an option and as a result has to pay quite a high percentage of their income towards tuition.
4) The cost of non-kosher food is generally far cheaper the kosher food.
5) The cost of living in general for an Orthodox Jewish family is far greater then a non-jewish family. Just realize we have two expensive 8 day holiday's a year, plus weekly "Thanksgivings" ect..

So the arguement can be made pretty convincingly that a college degree for an Orthodox Jewish person is simply not worth it since it require's a huge investment of money and at it's high end has very little hope of actually providing one with the income needed to cover expenses.

However opening one's own business (Disclaimer: That's the route I and my DH went and we are B"h being successful B"D) actually has a much better chance of eventually bringing in enough income to justify the investment and allow one to cover expenses plus the flexibilty of owning one's own business is priceless never mind the ability to control one's own work environment ( Not be forced to go to company holiday parties, non-kosher restaurant's and other sticky situations).

freidasima

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 2:53 am

In my parents generation many were Holocaust survivors whose education, both Jewish or Jewish and secular together, got cut off because of the war. After the war when they came to America most of my father's friends from Europe eventually went into business. Some did very well. I have no idea of course what their salaries were but they were enough to own two homes eventually, one in EY and one in NY, sometimes even a third in Florida. And we are talking the 1970s or 1980s. They were very bright, good with numbers, had great business sense and were willing to work day and night to support their families.

But it was also a time that the american economy flourished (after WWII) and they had a good chance of doing well. Others went into diamonds which was also a very good business at the time for Jews. However their children who stayed in diamonds (my age) did less well after the trade fell and many left to go to other businesses. Some made a good living, others less. I know people where the father was from Europe, in diamonds, the sons left diamonds to go to insurance, real estate, programming, the grandsons then went into their own businesses and I don't think that any had more than smicha or at most a technical course. All are doing well. All work or worked very hard. Does that mean that everyone can do it and make good money without a degree? Hard to think so. One needs business acumen, good economic conditions, a lot of connections which these people did thorugh friends, family, etc. and tremendous mazel and siata dishmaya.

Tablepoetry

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 3:01 am

amother wrote:

However opening one's own business (Disclaimer: That's the route I and my DH went and we are B"h being successful B"D) actually has a much better chance of eventually bringing in enough income to justify the investment and allow one to cover expenses plus the flexibilty of owning one's own business is priceless never mind the ability to control one's own work environment ( Not be forced to go to company holiday parties, non-kosher restaurant's and other sticky situations).

Opening a business is great.....for those with that talent. Not everyone has business sense. It takes a lot of skills to open a successful business - innovation, risk taking, street smarts, people skills, money management skills, etc, to say nothing of the necessity of having a skill or talent or product people actually want to spend money on.

I think I read somewhere that the majority of small businesses close within a year.

A college degree is a security net for all those (most of us) who don't have what it takes to be great business people. As Barbara showed above, the amount of college educated people who are unemployed is miniscule compared to the general population.

It is folly to assume that an entire segment of the population has what it takes to lead a business. It is folly to educate your kid in a manner that will make it nearly impossible for them to attain a degree and the security that comes with it.

ora_43

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 4:25 am

Tablepoetry Yes

I don't think you can talk about whether it's a better bet financially to get a degree or to open a business without talking about 1. what degree (and where) 2. what business (and where) 3. the individual involved.

People with degrees might earn more on average than people without degrees, but that doesn't mean that people with degrees in art history earn more, on average, than degree-less restaurant owners.

People with engineering degrees might earn well, on average, but that doesn't mean that someone who isn't particularly interested in engineering and doesn't have math skills should try to go into that field just for the money. For them, there probably isn't money to be made in that field.

I do think that higher education is a good idea in general, but at the same time, I admire the entrepreneurial skills many people have in communities where degrees are less common. I think it's important to teach that skill, too - the skill of seeing what people need that you can offer, and building a business around it.

In general, I think people will do best in their careers if they do the things that interest them and that they are good at. Obviously not, like, "I'm going to try to find someone to pay me to eat whipped cream straight out of the can while I watch TV," but like, if I enjoy writing, so I'll try to find a paying job in that. People often write off entire fields as things you can't make money in (there's no money in dancing/art/history/etc), but IME if you're sufficiently good at something, there's usually a way to make money.

amother

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 11:48 am

My point was that in many case's in the Orthodox-Jewish world a degree does not present a sense of security at all.
The whole thing it does is set thos who had "bitachon" in their degree up for a real dissapointment.
Barbara showed the median salary of someone with a degree as 45,000 dollars, for many Jewish fanily's that's barely enough to cover tuition!
Never mind the risk involved I.e someone might have started Law school year's ago and is graduating now facing a completley flooded market.

Someone might hav gone to medical school to become a DR. yet doctor's now were hit really hard by Obamacare and if trends hold they will continue to be hit har, if I recall correctly about 45% of private medical practice's in the U.S are actually turning a profit in other word's the majority are not.

So you can either have "bitachon" in your degree or you can work hard and have "Bitachon" in hashem and see which work's better LOL

I chose a business, I know other's that chose degree's. So far I'm pretty happy with my choice, I am not so sure they are with their's.

ora_43

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 1:23 pm

amother wrote:

So you can either have "bitachon" in your degree or you can work hard and have "Bitachon" in hashem and see which work's better LOL

I get that you were semi-joking here, but I think it bears repeating that choosing a career isn't only about money.

Most people I know who studied for degrees wanted to go into a field where a degree is absolutely necessary. It wasn't like, "I'm going to get a degree, and then I'll have a surefire guarantee against unemployment," it was like, "I want to be a nurse, and hard work isn't going to get me very far without actual nursing school, so I'd better go study."

amother

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 1:54 pm

100% if you really want to go into a field that a degree is an absolute requirement then go for it!

I just am a little leery of everyone who seem's to be implying that a degree is "security" ect...

Anybody who is out there at all know's there really is no guarantee, we do our best and have Bitachon in HKB"H.

My DH once saw the tuition rolls of a school (he was trying to help them) some of the people who were in the worst situation regarding tuition were Doctor's and Lawyer's, while business men were basically covering for them!

There are no guarantee's when it come's to parnossa.

amother

Sun, Aug 24 2014, 2:54 pm

amother wrote:

Other factors include:

1. Mental health (self, family)

2. Physical health (self, family)

3. Marriage stability

4. And anyone can be scammed at any time