jamesqf: Man, from what I read from you in this thread, your like from another planet to me. I mean no offense to you by saying that, but please realize that MOST of us likely are DUMB in your eyes. Shesh, I come from a world in which many people never made it to the 12th grade of High School! I have friends here without even a GED, and some of them MIGHT could learn more if they went back to school, but not all of them. I have more than High School, but if your going to rag on a man with a measly Harvard degree you sure will not be impressed by my education. YES Americans are that dumb! But it's not "cool" to see the world that way. It sounds to me as if you have been Blessed with a brain that most of us do not have. Gosh how I wish so many older people could just go back to school and learn all of these trades that you speak of so highly. However you can not teach a dog new tricks- There is really a lot of truth to that you know,? The older we get the more difficult it is to learn. Many of us just want a job, we do not all have the brains to get these degrees you speak of. Surely you can understand that the average American just can not get these degrees you speak of, especially at middle age and older.
I have tried going back to school to get this or that, and at my age I just "can't learn" as I used to. I can not get "my learn on" any more. haha - Wow I had never before meet a person that felt that a law degree from Harvard was anything less than an awesome thing. Count me in as one that also feels The President is very smart. I feel most anyone with a degree such as he has is smart. It would not matter to me what political party they were a member of. See, we come from two entirely different worlds. I'm almost speechless.
Oh: Re: The robots and machines replacing jobs- Gosh most of my previous jobs involved running the machines! There only tools of the trade they still need people to run and maintain the robots, and believe me, one does not often need a big degree to run or make minor adjustments/repairs etc to such machines. The robots did not take our jobs away, CHINA did!
I now understand why the economy does not seem so bad for you. (because it's not!)