&gt; In the Germanic world (Germany, Switzerland, Scandinavia) doing a degree is choosing a life path. You&#x27;re an Electronic Engineer? Great, you can apply for jobs in EE. Nobody else can.<p>Not really. Unemployment among people with college degrees wouldn&#x27;t be so low if hiring criteria were as strict as you intimate, and they aren&#x27;t. For example, I have a Ph.D. in computer science and work at my university&#x27;s math department. I know astrophysicists working in IT and at least one historian (by training) working as a journalist. Businesses will hire someone with a college education not necessarily because they need the specific subject-related skills that have been installed into them in college, but just as much because of the subject-independent skills they learn; this is also why a master&#x27;s degree is still the gold standard: a bachelor&#x27;s degree in many quarters is still seen as something that&#x27;s too much like school where you receive knowledge rather than researching it, but neither conveys the practical skills of vocational training.<p>Humboldt&#x27;s ideal [1] has become more difficult to maintain in a world of ever expanding knowledge, but as an ideal, it still exists.<p>The exceptions are occupations with very specialized requirements (such as law, medicine, or teaching) and the vocational system: it&#x27;s actually one of the biggest drawbacks of the system, where changing careers (in a society where 90% have a credentialed education) can be a daunting perspective past your 20s, but where vocational training often being too specialized [2] may necessitate it. This is where the situation that you describe occurs far more often.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Humboldt%27s_Ideal" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Humboldt%27s_Ideal</a><p>[2] Vocational training has its own career paths and options to expand your skill sets, but that doesn&#x27;t always work.