High schools, urged on by parents, funnel as many kids as they can into colleges and universities with the intent that this is the surefire path to social mobility and, at a minimum, middleclass prosperity. This is the conventional wisdom. The conventional wisdom does not work anymore.

The barista at my local coffee shop is a fellow alum. We are ardent fans of the same football team. We both graduated with a bachelor’s degree in history, only fifty years apart. Ted earned his degree at a cost of $120,000 over a period of five years—which is about par for the course these days. He has sent out hundreds of resumes and cannot get a job interview.
My degree in history cost less than $5,000. I didn’t think to create a resume. I answered a newspaper ad, had one interview, and went to work for a Fortune One Hundred computer manufacturer.
There was a time in America when college was considered to be for the elite and to be too expensive. The cost of a four year degree was almost equal to the median family income. Only about seven percent of high school graduates ventured forth to the ivied halls. The academic demands were rigorous, but if the student earned her coveted sheepskin, a job and middle-class, or better, affluence were a virtual certainty. Generations of parents and students grew up with this vision.
Today the popular belief is that college is for everyone regardless of cost. If community college is included in the count, about seven in ten high school graduates blithely enroll in these institutions of high learning every fall expecting the same outcome as from years ago.
However, college in America does not work the way it used to.
It is simple as the rule of supply and demand. In this slowly recovery economy there are not nearly enough good jobs available of the type the typical college graduate has depended on in the past, and there is a Brobdingnagian army of potential candidates. According to the Department of Labor only about one in four traditional four-year college enrollees graduates and gets a good job. Another one in four graduate but are underemployed or unemployed while the dropouts are stigmatized in the job market. In all three out of four enrollees are just wasting their time and money. The opportunity cost adds up to millions of man years and billions of dollars. In addition seventy percent of the students have college loan debt which negatively impacts their ability to buy a house or save for retirement. According to the Department of Education twelve percent are in default. This is not the outcome that educators and parents had in mind.
There is more bad news. The grade point averages have remained about the same, but the quality of the education has been eroded. The time spent in academic pursuits—attending class and studying—has dropped by a third in fifty years. Today college students spend less time in academic pursuits than high school students. Many choose unmarketable majors. (Even President Obama recently took a swipe at Art History majors.) It is quite possible to earn that BA without taking any demanding courses. (Check your student’s class list for “The History of Rock and Roll.”) College graduates are not as well prepared as in the past, and today’s prospective employers approach hiring with a degree of skepticism.
In the past few years wages have been nearly stagnant. However, college costs have been escalating for years at a far greater rate than any other product or service in America. Today a four year degree at a state university costs twice the median family income. To gain higher and higher ratings, which would allow their schools to charge even more, the college administrators add additional costly programs, services, and facilities. (The climbing walls just get higher and higher.) This is not sustainable.
There is a law in microeconomics called the first law of demand which states, all other factors being equal, as the price of a good or service increases, consumer demand for the good or service will decrease, and vice versa. College attendance has dropped nine percent in the last two years.
Many colleges and universities today are “selling” an experience, not an education. The perfect storm: high costs, a poor product, and a disconnect between the educational institutions and the prospective employers have changed the game.