Your character and your education are two things that can't be taken from you, regardless of the whims of social and/or economic upheaval. I would choose knowledge over wealth in most any situation. Except the 3rd of each month, that's Bill Paying Day. Then I'd take wealth. LOL
It depends on what you define as 'education'. If it's that piece of paper degree, it gets devalued each year as people now need Masters and MBAs to even think about getting ahead. Sure, there's some knowledge in that training that prepares them for what's to come, but a lot of times a night school MBA course isn't going to bring a lot to the table besides the paper it's written on, and yet that's what's required. And as more people get this, the value decreases. So now it has to be something else to get the leg up on the competition.
My background (parents from India) believes in your first sentence like it's a religion. People go through great lengths to have their children educated there because there literally is no other road to a better life (more money). But if the goal is wealth, why focus so much on something that doesn't necessarily guarantee wealth? That's what I always found to be at odds with my own understanding of the world.
My wife comes from the 'education first' frame of mind. She has an MBA, several certifications, etc, and I support her in those pursuits because that's what makes her happy. But when it comes to the bottom line at the end of each month, it's all about the money--no matter how you earn it. Now, I'm not saying let's all be thugs and tout drug money, but there are hundreds of thousands of other ways to earn if you're smart enough--and some of those smarts have to include being educated enough on how things work to get to where you want to go--where and how you learn that doesn't really matter imo.
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Yes, but the education degree you financed has it's own value that is difficult to quantify. If you had struck it rich by keeping the stocks and not gone to school you could tell yourself, "Self, I'll get that degree later." But would you?
It's actually quite easy to quantify. You can earn X more per year because you have a degree vs a base of Y. That difference over time is what that degree is worth. Pan it out to a lifetime and the numbers are easy.
I used $20k for X and then I ran that for 20 years. 20x20=$400k. Factor in inflation and just for kicks, double that number, so $800k. If your stocks exceed that number at the end of 20 years, stocks win.
As far as degrees are concerned, it's a matter of why you're getting the degree.
Generally, people pursue higher education because it's a requirement to climb the ladder in a career. You either need the skills or the piece of paper saying that you have passed X. And people want to typically further their career to increase their salary (ie more money). But if you already have the money, would you pursue the same educational pursuits? I believe a lot of people wouldn't.
I love learning. I love learning new things, understanding concepts of this world, and absorbing what is the human condition. However, a lot of what I want to learn translates to nothing in terms of the career world (like CPU coolers and overclocking
). If money wasn't an object, sure I'd be all over multiple degrees--but money is an object.
I took a leave of absence from school, so technically I could return to finish my degree. Buy why did I want the degree? To be able to create things to build companies based on those things. What I've learned in the last few decades is that you outsource the grunt work, the finite details of your design (that's why others get employed), and focus on the spark that keeps bringing new ideas to the table. Sure I could go back and get the degree at some point after the money comes in, but it if impedes my greater goal of just creating, then why do it?
There's a lot of stigma to having a degree vs not, and unfortunately the degree piece of paper doesn't instantly make someone educated vs uneducated. Education and intelligence is a life-long task that doesn't start or stop when classes begin or end. And there's a lot of people that don't get this.
