A College Education Robert Reich Summary

In his article, “A College Education: How is it?” Robert Reich. He expresses why going to cost is worth the cost. He expands on saying that people who go to college and come out with degrees earn more income, 98 percent more, than those with a high diploma. In addition to this, the author points out that employers are more likely to hire someone with a college degree than someone without one. However, Reich also states that even when one has a college degree it does not guarantee them a good job. On top of this, jobs are being outsourced to other countries and some advanced technology, such as AI, has taken jobs away from people. For that reason, the pay of college graduates has dropped since 2000. Moreover, many college graduates are stuck in dead-end jobs. Despite all of this, more and more people every year are still going to college. One may argue that this is because having a college degree, even though it

is not as valuable as it was in the past, having a college degree gives you a little bit more security.

However, there are some other reasons.
One of these reasons is freedom. A significant amount of teenagers count the days until that move into college. For that reason that they will gain freedom from their parents. When you are living in your parents’ house, they can monitor what you are going to eat. For example, some of my friends’ parents would not allow them to drink soda. Similarly, my parent told my siblings and me we cannot fast food more than twice a week. Likewise, your parents can control how much you eat. My friend, Buster, was tell by his parents he need to lose weight, so he can only eat a certain amount of calories per day. Furthermore, while living in your parents’ house they determine when you eat. For

instance, during my senior year, I remember my dad telling me “Brennen, you cannot eat a full meal at 1 o’clock in the morning.” In addition to controlling your eating habitats, parents also can tell you when to get up and go to sleep. For that reason, my parents would not let me sleep past 12 PM on weekends. In the same parents have the power to decide what time you get up, they can also mandate where you can go and what time I had to be home by. Often, during my high school years, my parents would not let me go parties or go to sleepovers. In order words, people go to college because “they believe that they are more likely to have control over their lives” (Mangukia). Although this all may be true, some people may correctly argue that in college you have certain restrictions. However, these restrictions often, or at least in my case, as well as some other people I know, are less than the ones can home. Nevertheless, there are some individuals, like my older brother, who did not mind all the rules my parents had, but they still went go off to college.
My brother, and many other people like me, have a lust for knowledge. Growing up, my brother always was reading books. One day, asked him “Why do you like reading so much? It is so boring.” He responded, “I love reading because the more I read, the more I learn about the world around me.” Some of my friends back home also carried similar sentiments. For example, my friend, Chase, also a bookworm, expressed that there was so much to learn about the economics in the world and he could only learn so much under the guidance of are economics teacher. For that reason, he went to college to learn more about economics. Similarly, my oldest sister was always complaining how in high school our science professor would never go deep enough into the material. I remember one day, she came home from school saying that she wanted to be challenged and learn more the human brain and only working a college professor would clinch her thirst for knowledge. Even though some people, like my sister, brother, and friend, may go to college because of their lust for knowledge, some other people go to college for other reasons.
Most people know at least one person in their live that is always trying to better himself or herself. For me, it was my friend, Hannah. She was constantly trying to better herself. I remember her deciding she was going to train for a 4k because she wanted to become fit. In addition to this, she planned a school cleanup day because she wanted to help our school. She believed that he reached his full potential at home, under the guidance her parents, and need new experiences—to become the better version of them herself. Her drive to better herself is one of the reasons she went off to college. In her words, “in order for me to grow more as a person, I need to college.” Likewise, one of my friends, who graduated the year before me, expressed that the main reason that were going off to college because it would allow them to discover their true self and find what they are truly passionate about life. Often, growing up we can only view the world from one perspective. Going to college and engaging in a dialogue with people with different backgrounds and experience, helps us to view the world from different perspectives. As a result, we can become better versions of ourselves.
People do go to college for financial reasons. However, they also go to college for other reasons: to gain freedom from their parents, to clinch their lust for knowledge and to become better a version of themselves. In order words, people do not decide if not are going to college purely based on economics.