Another educational setback

                       So today I read a handful of articles about college degrees. At least once a week there are new articles about the best degrees to have in the economy right now. There are articles about the costs of college, the odds of getting a job, the best and worst degrees, the unemployment rate, the amount of debt, and so on. As a relatively recent college graduate, these articles interest me a great deal. I do, of course, wish I had read some of them while I was still in college. For example, after graduating from college, I read a few articles that said how the soft sciences were bad degrees. Since my degree is in sociology, you can imagine how upsetting that was. It wasn’t completely disheartening though, because there had to be something out there I could use my degree on, right? Wrong. Every job that I look into that is related to my field requires a master’s degree. That just means more debt. According to yet another article, nearly one third of the student loan debt in this country is held by people with graduate degrees. And that debt is in the trillions, so it is no small number. In theory, graduate school is a great idea. Hell, college in general is a great idea right? All the numbers indicate that people with a degree make more money and the rate of unemployment for graduates is lower than people with just a high school diploma. Yet these people have more debt. To me, that means it comes to about the same result. I would also like to point out that the amount of graduates with decent paying jobs, or even any job at this point, has been declining since about 2006. What year did I graduate? I’ll give you one guess. I even moved to a major city where there would be more opportunities to get a good job. It didn’t happen. At this point, it would be fiscally irresponsible to go to grad school, and ridiculously irresponsible to go to law school. According to yet another article, lawyers are a dime a dozen. I have read that the most civil suits against universities are against law schools. A large number of law school graduates don’t even take the bar, and many don’t even get jobs in a legal field. I am well aware that nothing in life comes easy. And I am even aware that you have to work to get the things you want in life. Yet in today’s economy, these concepts take on a whole new meaning. If a student goes after what they want, and gets all the needed education up to graduate/law school, there is a pretty good chance that they will be unable to get a job. There is also a very good chance that they will not only not get a job that leads to their dream, but they will not get a job anywhere near related to their field. I have read, in multiple articles, that many college graduates are working multiple minimum wage/ menial jobs just to stay afloat. With the bills that come with being an adult and the repayment of student loans, having a degree is not all that special. At this point, I’m not even sure it is a good idea. So in my quest to decide what I want to do with my life, another road block has been thrown my way. Now, instead of just insecurities and the challenge of going back to school while working, I have to consider if it is even worth it. Do I want a graduate/law degree enough to risk it all?