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Antiwork

“Working your way through college” considering modern reality

I thought it would be nice to highlight something that has stuck out in my mind for a long time now, and that I think wraps up how ridiculous the idea of working your way through college is these days. I mean, we've all heard this before, the idea of getting a job to pay for college while you're still in college, so you don't go into debt. There is a problem here. Let's say you made enough money at your current job, without a degree, to afford your first undergraduate degree. The average cost of a bachelor's degree is around $40,000 in the US, although this admittedly varies, and some people will go through community college or whatever to reduce their cost, but we're trying for an apples-to-apples comparison here with a plain old bachelor's from an in-state university. However, just to make it easier to swallow, I'll slip…


I thought it would be nice to highlight something that has stuck out in my mind for a long time now, and that I think wraps up how ridiculous the idea of working your way through college is these days. I mean, we've all heard this before, the idea of getting a job to pay for college while you're still in college, so you don't go into debt. There is a problem here.

Let's say you made enough money at your current job, without a degree, to afford your first undergraduate degree. The average cost of a bachelor's degree is around $40,000 in the US, although this admittedly varies, and some people will go through community college or whatever to reduce their cost, but we're trying for an apples-to-apples comparison here with a plain old bachelor's from an in-state university. However, just to make it easier to swallow, I'll slip it down to 35k.

So, in this thought, you've managed to make a spare $8750 each year at your job to pay for school, and that's after paying for all your necessities. We can assume some college town like Norman, Oklahoma, which has a slightly lower than average cost of living for the US. You will still need to make 8750 dollars in excess of that cost of living to work your way through college.

This is also after taxes, so consider the kind of salary you'd need to pull down, without a degree, to accomplish that. I'm thinking around 40k. However, that is not the problem here. It's really not. If you had such a job, and could afford to save 8750 dollars every year, you are already set. That is a ridiculous amount of money to be able to save every year. Simply putting that much every year into a 401(k) from age 18 means you will be able to retire early and comfortably without ever getting a raise.

The system we live in now does not reward you for “working your way through college.” If you were capable of doing so, you would not need to. It could potentially increase your salary, but this still comes at an opportunity cost. Early investment is much more effective in the long run relative to short-term investments. So, for many people who are advised to “just work their way through college,” if they had the opportunity, they would probably be better off just hitting up the library and saving their cash. They already won.

Disclaimer: I am in favor of higher education because learning is worthwhile for its own sake. This is about the use of college as a means to raise personal income.

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