When reading the previous post, it should be noted that I just finished reading Nickel and Dimed: On (Not ) Getting By In America by Barbara Ehrenreich, and am understandably really effing pissed about the inequalities present in higher education and the earning potential for the haves and the have-nots. In the interest of educating oneself before making a major life decision—like whether or not to matriculate—I would advise reading that short but informative non-fiction number.

I have never been a lay-about and no couch has ever been imprinted with the shape of my heinie for long, but after reading Nickel and Dimed I’ve been avoiding even walking past my couch. Now all I want to do is get ahead and get ahead and get ahead until there’s no more ahead to get to. I never want to be at the mercy of any backwards and impossible-to-get-out-of financial system. Fortunately for me, there’s little chance of that. And here is the why: Because my awesome parents (who were not loaded, by any stretch of the imagination) saved their asses off for 18 years so I could go to college.

I realize that my situation is a lucky one, and that most young adults are either on their own to pay for college, or, if their parents tried to save, were ultimately unable to save enough to compensate for the recession and/or the staggering increase in tuition rates. Everyone seems to be in agreement that paying for college bites. But if you can at all manage it, in any way, then for god’s sake, go to school. Because I cannot live in a world where going to college is a mistake.

Posted by Alexa Harrington