So sorry you have to keep going through that. It always sucks.

Yeah makes me feel like an inch tall every single time. Like I'm a failure in their eyes unless I do this one arbitrary thing. I know people who attended college, racked up unsurmountable debt, and the jobs they learned to do didn't exist after they graduated. They're making minimum-wage. At least I'm making a lot more than minimum wage right now. But I have to wonder if my family would prefer me being broke and making minimum wage if it meant I had a college education that was doing me absolutely no good.

Unfortunately, some people just aren't grounded in reality. They should be happy for you and the successes you've had so far in your life. Not everyone needs college or can go to college. I wouldn't worry too much as its just their opinion and (making a big assumption) you probably don't see your aunt more than once a year anyway.

Heavy topic, and as someone who went to college, some insight.
I was fortunate in that my father had money set aside for me to go to college. I studied Architecture, I graduated with a 2.7 (High C) credit score. College taught me how to use a library, highlight text in a book, that my grades were better at Architectural history and structural engineering than Architecture, and not to drink too much at a party. College had me taking classes that had little to do with real life. It gave me a piece of paper that said I went to school for 4 years after high school.
It's the post college stuff that really hit.
Friends I knew before college who went straight into jobs and careers were making more money than I was when I graduated. When I hit retirement age, many of them were still making more money than I was, most weren't. Most of my peers were also making more money than I was. Some are the ones who went to vocational school. There's people out there who didn't even graduate that are millionaires. How you approach your career path carries a lot towards how successful you'll be, and it's up to you to decide what that is.
Almost all of what I learned about my career, I learned at the jobs I was working at. College pushed concept, jobs pushed practical knowledge.
Bottom line: If you're on a career path that's working for you, stick to it. If you need to change or tweak that path, look at some online college that will give you a new direction, or help you to step up your current path. N

Side comment.
Not meaning to sound sexist, just presenting a fact of our society. Women typically don't make much money unless they have some form of useful college degree. So yeah, most likely that's the only reason your Aunt "quadrupled" her income.
Also, if you're expressing dissatisfaction with your current job status, that could be the reason why you're being asked about attending college.

The conversation just came up out of nowhere. Or maybe it was because she asked if I bought a house yet and I scoffed and mentioned the homes near me currently on the market for $300,000 and only being worth around $80,000 and nobody could afford that inflated crap. So then she just asked as if it were no big deal, "Well I thought you were going to go to college and become a pharmacist?"

And I'm like, "Uh...no? At no point in my life did I ever hint at, joke at, or discuss that as a profession in any capacity. It's also like four years of college and another six of med school, neither of which I'm qualified for and neither of which I can afford? I'd need probably two years of remedial classes on top of that."

She just waved her hand and said, "Yeah, nice excuses".

When I had to have these conversations with my father, it was already frustrating/aggravating to a very high degree because it made me feel so small and worthless and like he didn't respect me at all because I didn't have a job he respected. Which he accidentally confirmed for me years later when I casually mentioned I might try for a promotion and he exclaimed, "Oh thank god! I can't wait to tell the rest of the family you're actually doing something now". So it already gets under my skin when this subject comes up because I'm reminded of that.

And again, as per my journal post, nobody seems to treat college with the sort of gravitas it seems to need. These family members of mine act like it's so casual like it's running to the grocery store to pick something up. Like it's just something you go and do. I know next to nothing concrete about college, but I'm fairly sure you need to plan a lot more than that. Like, do you want to know why I never attended college? Just off the top of my head -

-Terrible grades in high school. Failed multiple subjects repeatedly. I excelled in math, science, and English. But I failed Spanish, and social studies.
-High school didn't offer SAT exams. So I never did those.
-No idea what sort of major to pick because I have no idea what job markets I'd fit into or would be necessary a decade from now.
-You'd probably have guessed this one already, but there weren't any guidance counselors at my school. Well there was one "assigned" to me, but all he did was interrupt one of my classes to inform me that someone hacked into the school's database and deleted a bunch of records so they were going to retroactively fail any students in any subject with a missing record. So I retroactively failed sophomore-level English. He informed me of this, loudly, to my entire AP English class. Yes you read that right.
-Several classes people take for granted were not offered at my high school - including chemistry, civics, and advanced mathematics like trigonometry and calculus. Hard to know what else I missed out on because you don't know you missed out on something unless someone informs you of it.
-I was then, and still am, suffering from unmedicated ADD which contributed to my terrible grades, at least on my weaker subjects. I don't even have a handle on my day to day life, I don't know why people think I could suddenly develop the ability to navigate the needlessly complex college system on my own.
-I honestly have no real idea of how college really works. I hear people talking about "undergrads" and it sounds like a polite term for "person who failed all their classes and was held back a year". I could google it and find out for sure if that's what it is, but honestly it's more useful as a benchmark for how completely alien all this is to me.

I have no idea how any of this is supposed to work. Everything from how you qualify for a college to begin with, how you pick one out, how you apply, hell even what to do if they accept you? Where to go, what to do, what classes to take, how to deal with the work load, how to pick a major. NONE of this was ever part of my family discussions or high school education. It's like everybody is standing around expecting everybody else to have already taught these complex subjects. Everyone expects me to just *know* things about very complex and life-altering decisions that needed to happen over 20 years ago.

Speaking of that - is the draft still a thing? Like, I thought that was abolished after the Vietnam war? But one of my coworkers said that all men in the US still have to sign up for it or something? Is that true? I never heard anything about that. I feel like they're pulling my leg.

From where I sit, when people say things like, "Oh yeah you should go to college, get a degree, and get a great job!". It sounds a lot like, "Oh, you should just take a knife and perform some open-heart surgery on a random person like it's no big deal. You'll do fine!"

I also never had any guidance to determine what to do with my life in High School. I decided on Architecture because I enjoy drafting and my cousin had just started Architecture at a different university. My career path turned more into and Arch-engineer as I spent most of my working life designing factories at engineering firms. It was only the last 8 or so years that I was designing anything aesthetic - strip shopping malls and apartment complexes.

I find it unbelievable that a high school did not teach trig or calculus. wow...

I had no idea how to apply for college. I basically ended up writing the various universities that carried programs I was interested in and had them send me an application. Then you wait for an acceptance or denial response. I guess nowadays you do it online. The one I attended required an interview.
Undergraduate studies get you a 4 year degree - be it a bachelors or other similar level of degree.. Graduate studies gets you a master in that same degree and takes an additional 2 years.

All that being said, having a degree doesn't guarantee a well paying career. I know people who have degrees and ended up being overworked and underpaid restaurant managers.
As for owning a house, IF you could even afford one, do you want to be spending your free time mowing grass and what money you have left on repairs?

Architecture sounds...peaceful. When I was living in NYC and visiting Manhattan, there were so many beautiful, ornate buildings of old. It's not something I'd want to do as a job, but I could definitely appreciate seeing the majestic beauty of all those wonderful structures and wanting to build (ha! A pun!) your life around that.

A high school not having trig and calculus is bad enough, but the chemistry one is what really pissed me off because all my friends always talk about how chemistry was such a fun class to take. Complicated note: due to unstable home life, in my sophomore year of high school, I went from living with my mother in Nevada, to living with my dad in NYC. And that's what caused all these problems because the school in NV wasn't perfect, but it was stable and decent and had a full curriculum. But in NV, chemistry is a junior-level course, so I was moved out of the school system before I could take it. In NYC, they just didn't have any teachers employed that taught it. So, it just wasn't taught. That's what I was told at the time when I asked about it. And I suspect that it's the same reason for civics and advanced mathematics, but I didn't know to ask because I didn't know I was missing out on that at the time.

But it's an inner-city high school. A school built in the 1930's and...actually come to think of it, it was very nice and ornate and built really well. Something an architect might appreciate :) I'll DM you a link to it on Google maps.

Anyway, on my first day there, my teachers told me that the school was built with a capacity estimate of about 1900 students. My senior class, alone, was larger than that (though only about 700 graduated). At the time I graduated, 4,300 students were attending. The schedule was divided up into morning and evening sessions. For some reason, Junior/senior classes were in the morning (7am-noon). And yes that means my school day was only that long. And then 12:30pm-5pm were the freshmen and sophomore classes. And yes though it is cliche to point out, some classes were, in fact, held in repurposed storage rooms and larger closets.

But I suppose all that is a digression. I would have loved to have the college experience for a better understanding of the world, for more stable employment, more stable finances, for some sort of socializing when I was young. I wanted all of that. In the same vein, my interest in buying a (small) house is for the stability. My rent has doubled, my living space has not. My rent will continue to go up and this coming year is the last year I can afford to live here despite tripling my income compared to the time I first moved in. I know homeowners still pay taxes which can go up, but the increases aren't as drastic, and you're still owning property for all the time you put in. Something you can later sell. It's an investment at the very least. So in that sense, yes, I did want to be a homeowner. But I suppose now I'm just going to have to wait for the next housing market crash to be able to afford anything. I'm still out all this extra money, but I don't have anything to show for it.

I'm not sure where you currently live, but I know the cost of everything (residential wise) in the northeast and out west is much higher (at least 2 or 3x) than the cost of something similar in the south/southeast. Have you ever considered moving to someplace more affordable? Over the last 10-15 years, there's been a large influx of people moving here from other parts of the country to escape the higher cost of living.

Considered it, but with trepidation. I'm good at my job and can get a transfer easily enough, but I've worked with enough bosses to know that there's a high likelihood of a future boss being an ignoramus. I've had very long, uphill battles to straighten out or kick out corrupt, lazy, inept, and outright malicious managers where I work. I was only able to do that because at the beginning I was the only person willing to do certain jobs, and later on because I had the seniority and sheer audacity to stand up to my managers. If I move and there's corrupt or inept managers where I go, I won't have any leverage and possibly be out of a job.

Where I live is in PA. There are cheaper parts of PA, but this isn't one of them. I don't want to get into specifics, so let's just say, "Not any major city like Philly or Pitts, and not a small town".

All that said, I would like to re-iterate that "yes" it is something I've considered. And something I still consider. Just that, I don't feel that option is high on my list due to the aforementioned job concerns. If it came down to it though, yes, absolutely I'd pursue moving elsewhere.

Although I think that it's probably a good idea for most people to go to college, it is important to note that it is not for everyone, nor is it the only path to success. Plenty of people don't go and do fine. You could join the military, go to trade school, or start a business to name a few. I mean for me, I went to college but I don't use my degree in what I do. Now I can't say I know for sure it hasn't helped me get some interviews as many require a Bachelors as prerequisites. But the long story short, there are many paths through life.

I suppose you could cave and say okay yes, tomorrow I'm signing up for Rodeo Clown College, there, now I'll have a degree..

There's something the fabulous marketing of multicolored breakfast cereals and college degrees, a degree can be helpful but sometimes its very much not helpful.