Myths

We live in an age of myths, spun by talking heads in media. This morning I was treated to a stern woman's voice. I paraphrase: "People with post-graduate degrees make three times the income of people with a high school diploma or less over a lifetime." This is spongy science at best. Who are these post-grads? Are they real people, or are they a statistical group which includes the occasional billionaire and trust-fund baby among the more modest earners who are deep in debt with student loans? My guess is that they are the latter, a statistical group gathered to promote student loans. 

This particular myth supports the premise that educational debt (student loans) are a good thing. The university-banking complex wants students who will support inflated administrative salaries, football super-stadiums and token financial aide programs. This is intentional or unintentional propaganda. It doesn't matter which. The reality is that there is no room in the workforce for unlimited post-graduate scholars at high salaries. The reality is that there are too few affordable skilled (union-trained) plumbers, electricians and carpenters. The areas in which there are too few post-grads (medicine and dentistry, for example) are closely restricted to prevent too much competition and lowered incomes in those professions. 

I am tired of hearing unchallenged myths in media in this age of public complacency. Complacency and conformity are antithetical to any personal practice of ethical honesty and responsibility. Unfortunately, too many educated individuals in U.S. society are choosing conformity and complacency in order to fulfill the materialistic programming they have received through the media. Hearing a post-grad-educated individual say, "It's all good." makes me cringe. It is a bold admission of surrender to the sway of materialism by someone whose own life is "all good" at the expense of many lives which are not by any measure.