What do people without a college education do?

I've read that about 30% of Americans have a college education. What do the remaining 70% without a college education do as jobs?

Maybe it's because I work in a professional environment in the Silicon Valley, but I never seem to really run into people without at least a college education.

So where are these people and what do they do?

Originally Posted by drake

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I've read that about 30% of Americans have a college education. What do the remaining 70% without a college education do as jobs?

Maybe it's because I work in a professional environment in the Silicon Valley, but I never seem to really run into people without at least a college education.

So where are these people and what do they do?

Yeah it is pretty weird because college is the new high school because some pretty stupid people are handed out degrees. I'm guessing the rest go on welfare or found some way to make money right out of high school and said screw college. I have met a couple people who lie about their degree in Silicon Valley. Also, it seems most educated people migrate towards the coasts.

They amass sizeable My Little Pony collections. Can't you just imagine a working class trailer queen owning these abortions?

Do English bespoke tailors attend college? They are doing pretty well for being so damn uneducated.

Haven't any of you heard of plumbers, carpenters, electricians, cabinetmakers or indeed (in our context) pretty much any bespoke artisan who makes shirts, suits or shoes??

As Tiecollector said, college is the new high school.
As a result, in Australia at least, there's been a decline in people working in the so-called "blue collar" professions. Combine that existing scarcity with a boom in the building industry, and a lot of builders/carpenters/plumbers/electricians and associated professions are pulling in a lot more than most people with college degrees - easily above $100k/yr and in many cases, quite a lot more.
One of the managers at my work lives in quite a pleasant area where most houses easily sell for $600 - 700 000, and virtually all of his neighbours are blue collar workers.

I know a number of people working in IT who don't have a college degree - they're basically self-taught geeks who excel in that sort of work and got their first jobs on the basis of their programming/IT system maintenance skills instead of their qualifications.

It's amazing how uninformed & unaware some of those people that boast a US college education can be!

If they have a feel for business and are smart they are making a **** load of money the other people are either lazy dont work or have simple minimum wage paying jobs or are involved in a job as mentioned before such as construction , plumbers etc. I knew plenty of people without a college education who are doing a million times better then people who got master degrees etc but it is true that this does not always happened. I believe if you a hustlers spirit you can make it wherever you go and whatever you do.

Holy Ivory Towers.

Journeyman has it right. All the jobs formerly referred to as 'trades' don't require a college degree, though some require post-secondary technical training. In addition to the standard plumbers, carpenters and other construction jobs (which is a truly huge set), you have technicians of every stripe (the guys who work for the engineers doing prototyping, another huge group), maintenance techs for all the equipment we have out there, lots of people in sales (the hustlers, typically), many entertainers, and on and on and on. This is all in addition to clerks, tellers, cashiers, auto mechanics, etc.

I know they say you computer geeks live sheltered lives in the Valley but geez.

I personally know welders (ASME certified pipe welders, to be precise) who pull down nearly 200k USD/yr, and 100k is not uncommon for an experienced welder.

~ Huntsman

When was the last time you had a handyman or contractor out to your house to do work? I had a guy over to do some painting, finish work, and to work on our fence I will bet after the cost of materials, he earned $50/hour easy. Damndest thing is, the guy is so busy, its hard to even book him less than a month in advance. This may taper off with the bust going on in housing, but lazy people like me still need his services to do the **** they don't want to do.

I don't have a college degree, and I'm currently doing rather well as an independent computer consultant/contract programmer. Over the years, I've worked with quite a few developers without college degrees.

After a certain point in my career, I've found that people don't even ask me about college anymore. By building a good network of professional contacts, and having a reputation of being able to deliver quality goods and services, I manage to keep myself as busy as I want to be.

Yeah it is pretty ridiculous how much some of these blue collar folks make. If they work for themselves they pull in 6 digits easy. You'd think with all the cheap labor that some of these prices would go down. I guess it only takes one boss to set the prices and he must make a killing.

Ever notice the housing boom? I'll bet those contractors are multi-millionaires and barely graduated high school, and they hire cheap labor on top of that. Some people get a taste for the money and see how easy money is to make sometimes.

Even the Mexican gardeners that blow leaves all day wanted $35/week from my grandma to spend 15 minutes blowing some leaves around. It really is amazing what some people will pay for things out of laziness.

Much as I suspected! All these blue collar types are just whining "off shore this" and "illegal labor undercutting us that" and they are actually in the top few percent of wage earners. I think they are not paying their fair share. For the record, the vast bulk of my employees do not have a four year degree. Everything from dishwashers that make ~8/hour to nurse aides that make ~12 an hour. If you count "diploma RNs", someone that took a two year community college course and got their RN, then I have non-university grads making ~65 on average, up to 100k if they do a lot of OT.

Live off of welfare, duh!

The guy who did the plumbing in my parents house didn't finish high school. He's got a 1.5 million dollar house yet spends much of his time on the 3 boats he owns.

Seriously though I know where you are coming from asking such a question. I'm engaged to a lawyer and am working on completing my PhD. We recently started looking for houses and with me in school and her working 80 hrs a week are limited in how much we will be able to spend. We were both commenting yesterday that even though the pocket is a little tight right now, neither of us have any major debt and in 5 yrs will hopefully be making a decent combined salary. I could never imagine being my age (28) and knowing that over the course of my life, my potential earnings might not be much more than I am making now. I suppose that many people have very meager wants and dont really care about fast cars and handmade shirts.

dl

On average (mean), college dropouts are richer than college graduates. So I suppose they are busy owning the world you live in.

I thought people here were insulated after reading the Bush Tax Cut thread and whining about 150k income, then I read this thread.