For those of you that believe college is expensive consider the following article found recently.
Is a College Education Worth It?
According to the National Center for Education Statistics, in 2004 the unemployment rate for adults aged 25 years and older who had not completed high school was 8.5 percent. For those who had completed high school, the rate was 5.0 percent. But for those with bachelor's degrees, the number was just 2.7 percent. In other words, those without a college degree were nearly twice as likely to experience unemployment.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, bachelor's degree holders earn on average double the annual salary of someone with just a high school diploma. And if the size of your monthly paycheck isn't enough to motivate you to get your degree, consider this: Over an adult's working life, high school graduates earn an average of $1.2 million; associate's degree holders earn about $1.6 million; and bachelor's degree holders earn about $2.1 million. Those are some serious differences
The Institute's 1998 report lists encouraging demographic statistics for college graduates. For example, many with college degrees have priceless health benefits such as longer life expectancy. People with four-year degrees smoke less and tend to make better consumer choices to benefit their health and lifestyle. Even more important to many parents who are considering going back to school, kids raised by parents with college degrees are more likely to graduate high school and go on to college. And teenage daughters of college grads are less likely to become unwed mothers.
The salary, employment, and fringe benefits that college graduates enjoy allow the unexpected benefit of the fun factor. Because college graduates have a higher disposable income and get more vacation time, they're more likely to visit amusement parks and art museums, attend sporting events, and go hiking and camping. They also tend to read more, and for many people that is fun in and of itself.
While having better benefits, more money, and more leisure time are surely very valuable reasons to get your college degree, there are many intangible reasons why pursing a degree is worthwhile. For example, you will have the satisfaction of learning about things that interest you and expanding your knowledge and skills. It's unlikely that most college students think about the rewards of their studies in these terms, but these perks are greatly appreciated after graduation.
And if that isn’t enough consider the following
(AmeriStat, August 2002) When asked to list the benefits of a college education, most people name higher incomes and a rich intellectual life. Now it is clear that better health should be added to the list.
Mortality rates for Americans ages 25 to 64 who have attended college are less than half the rates for those who stopped education after completing high school. In 1999, the most recent year for which final mortality rates have been published, there were 219 deaths per 100,000 people per year for those with 13 or more years of education, compared with 474 per 100,000 for those with 12 years, and 585 per 100,000 for those with fewer than 12 years of education. These differences are somewhat greater for men than for women.
The mortality advantage for Americans with higher education has been growing in recent decades, according to several studies that used census and survey data. And there is an added advantage for educated people in rates of illness and disability, so that those with some college education enjoy extra years of healthy life. Two factors that partly explain the education advantage are lifestyle (educated people are less likely to smoke or engage in other risky behaviors) and health insurance (people with more education tend to have better coverage than those with less education).
Note: Rates are adjusted to the 2000 age distribution. Rates are not published for those less than 25 years old, for many of whom education is not yet completed, nor for those over age 64, for whom death certificates often do not contain precise information on educational attainment. Data for single years from 1994 to 1998 are available from the National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control, Health, United States, 2001 (table 35) at www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus01.pdf.
Donna L. Lyert, Elizabeth Arias et al., "Deaths: Final Data for 1999," National Vital Statistics Reports 49, no. 8 (2001): table 23.