People in the US think that everyone should go to college. Just think though, as a doctor, if I charge $100 to see someone, Medicare only pays $32. It doesn´t matter if it was at 2am or 2pm. A plumber, gets paid what he or she charges, extra if it is after hours.

Uh-huh, sure they are.

If I read another one of those articles that show income differences between college grads and non-college grads, I´m going to scream.

I would like to know what the income diference is between welders, and the millions of kids who have absolutely no business going to college but are pushed there by HS administrators who want to make their schools look good on paper.

The article talks about qualified applicants needing math. However, the math that is currently taught in high schools is not what they need. In many schools, trigonometry has been dropped in favor of algebra 2 and calculus. Welding doesn´t require algebra 2 and calculus. Practical math gets ignored in favor of theoretical.

Being degreed in a certain field also does not mean the most intelligent of their field; i.e., a family member without a degree in engineering took a project which had been in limbo almost a year without progress from a group of engineers and was capable of solving the problem in a matter of a couple of months. A lot of common sense would have helped with those degrees. With another project the family member´s leadership, a problem solving program to possibly save multi-millions to billions for the company led to a patent application for intellectual property rights--naming the family member as a co-participant on the project for which they had given all credit to their team members but the team members recognized the leadership. Knowledge of work product co-mingled with common sense produced results in both incidents.

Vocation Education = blue collar and service sector jobs. Back in the mid 90s the brain trust of the USA had decreed that those are peasants job to be outsourced to some other third world hole so we will be a nation of high paying white collar desk jockeys (doctors, lawyers, engineers, managers, indian chiefs) and that was their roadmap to prosperity. I kid you not. Heard the whole thing on NPR while stuck in traffic during a drive home one night.

Part of the problem is tech schools tell these students they will make an unrealistic amount of money on day one. Another is they can´t read the blueprints.
They will work two weeks on one job and tell the next employer they have experience.

Somebody has to make the donuts.