Every year we are given the conventional wisdom from almost 95 percent of the people "Go to school, get your degree so you can be successful in life". We are prepared in our educational systems to eventually one day get a job from a major to mid-level corporation and work for them to earn a living. The whole society judges your personal worth and success based on whether or not you have a job. Not just do you have a job, but did you get a degree so you can get a high paying job.
Almost anyone you meet in the world has been told to go this route if they want to have some sort of perceived ideal lifestyle. There are hardly any jobs worth having that will judge your ability to do the job just based on if they can see if you are able to do it from an eye test or any aquired knowledge that you picked up outside of a school. From the looks of the whole situation it appears that you are basically shut out from society if you don't get a degree from some educational institution. And this is correct for just about anyone when you judge it from a pure labor requirement standpoint.
The major problem I have with this conventional wisdom is that it seems to be the only teaching worth any value in society that most people embrace when it comes to personal and family economics. If you dare to mention almost any other route when it comes to money making it is held in a lower esteem by the bulk of people. As a result of the college mantra that is hammered home by the broader society and the educational institutions most people and their families fail to learn how money is really made.
When the importance of entreprenuership is not a prevailing idea in society held just as high as obtaining a college degree, then this creates masses of people who only know one strategy when it comes to money making. And when that strategy is working for an employer your entire life, then you have a nation of people who are slaves to employment. The problem with being an employment slave is that it's very volatile especially in todays economy even with a degree.
When you base your entire life on getting a job, and you don't seek other options you are put in a position where you have to put up with working long hours, putting up with in-office racism, lack of opportunity for advancement due to high job competition, lack of ability to tend to family matters that require time off for fear of getting fired, economic unstablity of the company you work for which can result in layoffs and company closings. And to add to this during times of economic instability people tend to find it hard to even find a job in alot of cases. The entire job/college phenomenon can leave you in a position where you have very little to no leverage. What is the real solution?
In todays world we have to know the importance of entreprenuerial knowledge and how to apply it. I'm not saying in this article that everyone should not pursue a college degree and just run to entreprenuership, but what I am saying in todays world is that people are now going to have to learn both disciplines. As I stated in one of the above paragraphs, job employment holds very little leverage. What do I mean by leverage. Leverage in my definition is how many ways do you have to make a buck.
A job when you look at it scientifically only allows you one income stream in the form of a weekly or bi-weekly paycheck. On top of this, each time you receive that paycheck you are only receiving what you made after taxes! And not just after taxes, but after you've been taxed heavily. Entrepreneurship on the other hand allows for you to have more leverage according to my definition. Entrepreneurship allows for you to be able to earn from multiple income streams, it allows for you to own the rights to a particular financial instrument and it allows for you to be in full control of what you're doing without getting fired. To add to this you have the power to be able to help many people, which is not in high possibility in the case of a job.
What we need to know and be taught in todays world is how can we take the income from our jobs and turn it into business income for ourselves so that when the day comes for you to get fired from that job, or if you are just tired of it and you want to leave for personal reasons you have the ability to do so without being afraid of what you will do other than go around submitting hundreds of job applications when you have a family to take care of and bills pilling up like gangbusters.
Additionaly we need to be aware of what business vehicles are at our disposal to operate successfuly while we are in the building stages and having to stay working at whatever we are employed with. With the advent of the internet and online marketing which can allow you to run a profitable business working only 5 to 10 hours a week versus the traditional store front business which requires a lot of time and resources.
This has opened up an additional avenue for the busy professional who just simply doesn't have time to run a business according to the traditional model that one has to be ran. So now is definitely a more advantageous time to start adjusting some of the popular social doctrines that are taught to people about school. In todays world people are now in my opinion forced to seek other options to go along with school in order to survive the volatility of job markets. Entrepreneurship is a very key element that people can not afford to stay ignorant about.