College loses its monopoly on the American Dream

AxiosAugust 15, 2026en

Whether framed on an office wall, collecting dust in a box or still a distant dream, the college diploma is getting a hard reappraisal. Why it matters: College was once sold as a ticket to the American dream. But students today are taking a tougher look at the college tradeoff: burdensome debt and no guarantee of a dream career — or employment at all, as AI threatens the jobs the degrees were meant to unlock. "People didn't ask whether college mattered 20 years ago," says Courtney Brown, the vice president of impact and planning at Lumina Foundation. Now, "they're asking: Are today's students going to be prepared for tomorrow's jobs? Is it really helping them out?" Confidence in higher educa

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