The Dangers of the College Degree-for-All Mentality

For over a decade, American society believed that a college degree was the guaranteed ticket to success and upward mobility. Through the 2010s, the college degree-for-all mentality evolved from a mantra repeated in Democratic circles to the national attitude of our nation’s parents and K–12 students.

The mentality was first adopted by Democratic politicians and powered by the media. In 2009, then-president Barack Obama launched the initiative in his inaugural address, pronouncing that “by 2020, America will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.”