bobtail3

I think you make a good point, but your numbers seem way off. What countries are you aware of that even get close to 60-80% of completed college education? The list below shows the highest at 61% for Canada (between the ages of 35-44) [1]. But that list is also including things like community college, trade schools, and other forms of professional development. It seems to me that a much more accurate range is something like 25-40% for most developed countries.

I think what is really going on with degrees being a poor investment, is that most degrees don't actually teach valuable skills or they do and the students just don't actually put in the necessary work to achieve those skills. Instead treating it as a game of how to pass while putting in as little work as possible. That was at least my experience TAing computer science courses. Most students were just not mature enough to value the education that was being offered.

EDIT: A more generous interpretation to the students would be that they were simply jaded after a lack luster and uninspiring high school education plus a similar experience in probably many of the college classes they were taking.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tertiary_...

Probably not exactly what he is talking about, but this also sounds similar to dithering. Where with repeated measurements and random noise you can statistically estimate the value of a signal below the quantization level.