Lots of interesting ideas here, but also some wacky or condescending assumptions about other people's lines of work. Let's take two:
TRUCK DRIVERS: They don't just move big rigs around. They also need to keep detailed log books, plan out routes, pass inspections -- and know how to talk civilly and constructively to DOT inspectors. An eighth grade education will not get you there. Especially on the last part. The back-and-forth of a high-school classroom socializes teenagers to work with authority. Most high school dropouts give up because they can't conform to those norms, not because they can't do the work. Trucking companies rightfully insist on a high school degree for exactly this reason.
FINANCIAL ADVISERS: Met any lately? I work in a co-lo space with several within 50 feet. They're all college educated, and they put non-obvious skills from their education to work, every day. They need to provide their clients with highly literate, personalized updates via quarterly letters. They need a sophisticated understanding of clients' expressed and unstated needs -- and you're not going to be fully capable of doing that with just a high school education. Some college-level psychology classes, history classes or behavioral econ classes will get you in the game. And if you actually want to be a financial adviser with some understanding of how markets work, an econ/finance major is your best path in.
Some of the other analysis is quite interesting. But the classification errors in this piece are more than just a matter of tweaking a spreadsheet. They come from a deeper misunderstanding of what many jobs are all about.
My father has been a truck driver from the late eighties on.
He is from rural Mexico and became a naturalized citizen of the US in his early 50s a couple years ago. The extent of his formal education was through 6th grade which was the furthest offered in his area when he grew up; he has had no further contact with the educational system since then.
In the nearly three decades that he has been driving trucks he has routinely won driver of the year awards as well as other frequent commendations for excellent performance in all job aspects while not a single time receiving a reprimand for uncivil or unconstructive conduct in any situation. His previous job experience before entering trucking in the 80s was a bit of construction work followed by quite a few years of dairy work; not places where he would have frequently encountered and worked along side better educated people that would have given him the opportunity to pick up on their habits and means of operating.
I believe that his example shows that it is not necessary to go through eighth grade to learn these skills; I suspect that rather than eighth grade imparting superior skill towards functioning in society, it is instead a filter for those students that our one-size-fits-all school system fails to accommodate that then disposes those students outside of the system without any recourse or additional assistance which sets them up for a failed and miserable life in many cases.
For what it's worth I have worked jobs between high school and college where I met people that graduated high school but lacked the ability to anything as slightly complex as the activities that you described. Eighth grade and beyond did not seem to have much effect in imparting those skills to them.
They also need to keep detailed log books,
>electronic log books
> plan out routes
And then get chewed out for wasting 30min deviating from the route the GPS says even though the GPS told you to go under an over-height bridge.
>pass inspections
CDL school deals with that.
>know how to talk civilly and constructively to DOT inspectors.
If you're talking to DOT anywhere other than a weigh station you're already screwed. If you're talking at a weigh station you need to know about three sentences of english.
You seem to think every trucker is an owner operator. Most are just "steering wheel holders" for a big dry van company. You don't need a high school degree for that. English literacy would probably be beneficial but I would say it's not a hard necessity.
Education credentials don't matter much anyway since many truckers are immigrants who speak little English (it works well for them for a variety of reasons) and who's education level doesn't map well onto the US system.
Basically, if you can pass the CDL exam you can move a dry van from A to B
> Trucking companies rightfully insist on a high school degree...
Not sure about these days, but ~10 years ago, my friend's family's company did not require a high school degree. To your point, however, I know this because he specifically complained about dealing with under educated employees.
From some rudimentary googling, it seems requiring a HS degree is the norm, but there are plenty of cases of forgoing the degree/GED.
Thanks for the extra info. It's almost worth a whole 'nother thread on the pros/cons of the GED and other high-school equivalency programs. Economics Nobel laureate James Hickman has done some big studies here.
If I remember right, he found that the GED was a good way of recognizing sound minds that had been too stormy to finish high school (prison population in particular), but that the social issues that limited some high-school dropouts' opportunities did not go away with this new certificate.
In the spirit of OP's main argument, there's room for a lot of cheaper/faster alternatives to college, especially for a lot of middle-skill positions. I like that part of the argument a lot. I'd just urge that we think harder about ways of helping candidates master the social/interpersonal skills that affect long-term success and employability. For now, it feels as if a face-to-face component is needed, too, beyond the technical skills that can be conveyed online.
Oddly, the standards for the GED are almost always much higher than those for a hs degree. The real issues are the 'christian homeschool' degree mills. I understand many states still make their graduates take the GED for that reason.
>TRUCK DRIVERS: They don't just move big rigs around. They also need to keep detailed log books, plan out routes, pass inspections -- and know how to talk civilly and constructively to DOT inspectors. An eighth grade education will not get you there. Especially on the last part. The back-and-forth of a high-school classroom socializes teenagers to work with authority. Most high school dropouts give up because they can't conform to those norms, not because they can't do the work. Trucking companies rightfully insist on a high school degree for exactly this reason.
ASSEMBLING IKEA FURNITURE: It's not just about unpacking the pieces. First one needs to plan out the transportation and move the items to their apartment safely. This is much faster and easier with the help of other people. The back-and-forth of a high-school classroom socializes teenagers to work together with their peers and to form groups when their problems are too hard to solve individually. During the actual assembly, one needs to consult the manual, which requires considerable attention to detail. IKEA rightfully requires its customers to have at least a high-school degree for those reasons.
Funny! Of course, the consequences of poorly assembled furniture are pretty trivial, so Ikea's current laissez-faire attitude towards its customers doesn't ruin society as we know it. (Besides, college grads like me are probably some of the worst furniture assemblers. We don't know what we don't know.) The consequences of truck-driving mistakes can be more serious, affecting many other lives in irreversible ways. Thus the greater interest in credentials, training, regulation, etc.
But I enjoyed the spoof anyway. Thanks for posting.
> They also need to keep detailed log books, plan out routes, pass inspections -- and know how to talk civilly and constructively to DOT inspectors. An eighth grade education will not get you there. Especially on the last part.
I don't think you need a high school or college education to learn how to talk civilly and constructively with authority; decent parents should be sufficient. Ignorance need not automatically mean petulance.
Let me guess - you think financial advisors aren't worth their fees, and their jobs are entirely obviated by index funds with sensible portfolio allocations. Is that about the sum of it?
Everyone who agrees with you already nodded to themselves in agreement and scrolled on. No one who doesn't already agree with your just-so statement was persuaded to consider a different perspective. You came into a conversation about the professional merits of education and used a passing comment about financial advisors to inject your ideology.
Problem is, like used car salesmen, lawyers and mechanics, they are a useful, if not nessarry people in many cases, but are also in a unique position to fuck you. A good one is worth their weight and then some. The extremes make for most public perception, and here we are.
Wow! Not sure where all these assumptions came from, but let's try to get back to the simple point of the original post. Financial advisers, at their best, inject common sense and steady judgment into the lives of some highly successful people who might make reckless money decisions otherwise. That's impossible without commanding the respect of your clients.
Consider a guy I know that we'll call Jack. He's rich and headstrong. On his own, he'd be buying jets and chasing hot tips in the stock market. A financial adviser helped Jack keep his money decisions sane enough that after the inevitable divorce, there was still enough money for Jack's kids to be able to go to college.
Focusing only on portfolio modeling (with or without index funds) misses the essence of the job. Getting the person-to-person stuff right is huge. College helps make that happen.
1 point by aswanson 2 minutes ago | parent | edit | delete [-] | on: Mike Judge, the Bard of Suck
Shut up. You went to a 4th rate school and are a 4th rate intellect doing backend web dev because you are 4th rate. Accept your lot in life, swallow it, and move on. You are inferior, and you know it. You are a genetic failure. Good night.
TRUCK DRIVERS: They don't just move big rigs around. They also need to keep detailed log books, plan out routes, pass inspections -- and know how to talk civilly and constructively to DOT inspectors. An eighth grade education will not get you there. Especially on the last part. The back-and-forth of a high-school classroom socializes teenagers to work with authority. Most high school dropouts give up because they can't conform to those norms, not because they can't do the work. Trucking companies rightfully insist on a high school degree for exactly this reason.
FINANCIAL ADVISERS: Met any lately? I work in a co-lo space with several within 50 feet. They're all college educated, and they put non-obvious skills from their education to work, every day. They need to provide their clients with highly literate, personalized updates via quarterly letters. They need a sophisticated understanding of clients' expressed and unstated needs -- and you're not going to be fully capable of doing that with just a high school education. Some college-level psychology classes, history classes or behavioral econ classes will get you in the game. And if you actually want to be a financial adviser with some understanding of how markets work, an econ/finance major is your best path in.
Some of the other analysis is quite interesting. But the classification errors in this piece are more than just a matter of tweaking a spreadsheet. They come from a deeper misunderstanding of what many jobs are all about.