I once heard the phrase, “If everyone is naked, then nobody is naked.” You might be thinking to yourself that this is the most backward, nonsensical statement you’ve ever read, and you’d be right to.

Nudity is really not a characteristic that can be looked at from a relative perspective. Academic progress, on the other hand, is one of many other aspects of society that can, in fact, be perceived as largely relative.

Now, let me clarify a pretty critical semantic issue that this brings up: when I say “academic,” I mean to refer to the social institution of education as we know it, not to education or learnedness in general. With that in mind, my point should come across something like this: if everyone is naked and has a Bachelor’s degree, then nobody is naked or employed. See what I mean?

I remember being a junior in high school and facing the first truly daunting choice of my pre-professional life: where to go to college. Notice that that I didn’t say “whether or not to go to college.” That’s because, in many ways, opting out wasn’t a choice for me. Coming as I did from an upper middle-class, suburban family in a competent public school district, completing high school was only considered an achievement if the graduate in question held an acceptance letter to a university, as well as their diploma, after commencement.

Faced with this expensive standard and not feeling drawn toward any particular university or professional field, it occurred to me that I live in a society that doesn’t make a distinction between “academia” and “education.” From the perspective of a teenager planning his academic career, ”education” outside of academia has little or no value in this country. What is an education without a diploma to prove it? An unemployable résumé, I guess.

This might seem like an impossible, idealistic bone to pick with the job industry, especially considering the current economic climate. After all, upholding the all-important lack of bias in the employment process would be pretty hard if the sanctity of college degrees was not so respected. However, the inflation of college degrees not only remains an important issue in this rocky economy, it may even have something to do with it.

The American Dream promises every citizen an equal opportunity to advance themselves and their progeny in terms of living condition and economic standing. Now, it doesn’t take the most jaded mind to realize that this isn’t quite how it works, and that the impoverished aren’t suddenly going to disappear and get integrated into the middle class.

That the American dream is becoming more of a black comedy farce each year isn’t as much of a tragedy to me as it is that blue collar jobs are associated with a failed professional life, and are compensated accordingly. With everyone looking to become a white collared professional, and more online colleges springing up each day to meet that demand, what will become of the blue collar backbone of this country’s industry? That’s not rhetorical. There’s a one word answer: outsourcing.

As I’m sure you’ve noticed, I’m no economist, but the notion of a country full of middle management with negligible domestic production brings up images of intricately built card houses in my mind. Obviously, we students have all chosen the path of post-secondary academia, and while we each have our own unique reasons, I want to urge you to know those reasons intimately. The forces that define professional success will always steer us toward the largest paycheck, and we might follow, but we should be resolved as to whether we are chasing success or happiness. It would be a rude awakening to discover, too late, that the two had gone and diverged, unnoticed.