DunninLA

JTurner823, the study referenced in your quote is discussed here --

Newsweek.com: Newsweek US Edition: Nation: The Worthless Ivy League?

And also referenced here --

http://www.brookings.edu/articles/20...brook.aspx?p=1

JTurner823

Thanks, DunninLA!

ring_of_fire

Look, I think people are misinterpreting what I'm saying. I absolutely treat everyone I meet with respect and engage them in conversation. However, education is something I value a lot and I generally admire people who have sensational educational backgrounds because I know from personal experience the type of stellar qualities and attributes one needs to get into a good school and succeed there.

With regards to janitors, I realize they hold an important yet unpleasant role in society and still greet them in a friendly manner when I see them. However, I do not hold them in high regards by any means and will tell my future kids that these are the sort of people that didn't work hard when they were younger and this is what became of them. I think unskilled workers can function as a good motivation for teenagers so they can set their priorities straight.

Let's face it, no one chooses to be a janitor. Janitors belong to the lower rung of society and we should feel sorry about their plight and their pitiful condition should serve as an example of why education is important.

Hope that cleared things up y'all.

lewtat

some things are better left unsaid.

"However, education is something I value a lot and I generally admire people who have sensational educational backgrounds because I know from personal experience the type of stellar qualities and attributes one needs to get into a good school and succeed there."

one's qualities are derived from the type of person they are, not the school they attend. some of the hardest working people in the world today are the happiest, regardless of their job or education.

ring of fire-just stop speaking

Grcxx3

oh my.....ring_of_fire - I really think you need to stop. You're just making the situation much worse with comments like -

"With regards to janitors, ...... However, I do not hold them in high regards by any means and will tell my future kids that these are the sort of people that didn't work hard when they were younger and this is what became of them."

You really have no clue about real life.

vinceh

ring_of_fire, I'm going to share some brilliant advice I got from my non-college-educated father:

"When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging."

deprofundis

I am embarrassed for Ring-of-Fire. I want this thread to end but can't help adding another pennyworth. The stuff about janitors is appalling. I am currently a part-time parish clerk. I earn very little, I look after my children and I am happy. I was college-educated, and I was happy then too. Ring-of-fire would have treated me with respect when I was at university, and with much disdain now. His loss.
In a book on management by Harry Beckwith, Meryl Streep says she is surprised to learn that life is more like high school than like college. Knowledge and advanced degrees are important in some ways - and that link earlier to the worthlessness of ivy league is really worth a read - but you succeed or fail in business, as in your family life, primarily by how likable you are, how you relate to other people, how you communicate with them, how you put their interests and needs in relation to your own, how comfortable you make them feel. Ring-of-fire has a lot to learn, and even more to unlearn...

MBA Grad 2009

"Lower rung" of society, hmmmm? Seems someone still has a jones for the old caste system, eh what?

anonymityyy

Wouldn't it be nice if life actually worked like this? You work hard, you succeed and live happily ever after? Oh wait...maybe some of those janitors had to drop out of high school to support their families. Maybe nobody ever expected them to go to college or explained to them that it was possible to get a scholarship. Maybe - this one's a shocker! - maybe college just wasn't the best choice for them and they are comfortable and content doing a simple, honest, much-needed job of "unskilled work".

Nah, they probably were just lazy and now everyone gets to look down on them. Haha! What idiots!

LasMa

ring_of_fire: I was going to tell you to stop digging, but vinceh covered that.

I gather that you think your last post was enlightened and magnanimous? You are completely missing the boat about what makes a person valuable. It has nothing to do with where or even whether they went to college, though. I feel sad for you if you don't already know that.

skateboarder

IBclass06, of course my comment was (semi) sarcastic. i have real reasons for my choice. Durrr basketball greek life durp durp durp.

DunninLA

ROF wrote: "...Janitors belong to the lower rung of society"

OK, NOW I get it. ROF is of Indian heritage. Rung = Caste.

MBA Grad 2009

At least we've had a reminder about Society. As much as I'd like to promise that we live in a meritocracy, the plain fact is that it does not always work out that way. anonymityyy observed that people fall into low-pay, low-respect jobs because of situations that sometimes happen despite hard work and ability. And I would note that, after 26 years of post-college employment (I went back for the MBA some 24 years after getting my bachelor's - long story), that sooner or later you will be denied a job/promotionb/raise because you did not go to the "right" school, you grew up in the "wrong" part of the world, you "don't fit" the image your company has of the ideal executive, you're too young, too old, too fat, too pretty, too aggressive, too timid, et cetera ad nauseum. When that happens to you, it's a small comfort to realize that it happens to almost everyone. And the ones to whom it has not yet happened, sometimes fall into the illusion that it is because they are superior to everyone else. Ken Lay never put a foot wrong in his life ... until Enron fell apart and he helped destroy the careers of thousands of people and the life savings of thousands more. Robert Nardelli was unanimously acclaimed as a brilliant man who was just right to be a CEO ... and in his career he drove out thousands of talented employees from General Electric, nearly killed Home Depot, and helped drive Chrysler into its bankruptcy. Yet the man is still considered a top business leader and has no intention of reconsidering the way he runs his companies or treats his employees. Bernie Ebbers thought nothing of lying to his family, his board, his employees, or his stockholders. And Martha Stewart still insists she did nothing wrong in her ImClone fraud and obstruction of justice. There's no shortage of people who think that ethical treatment of employees and colleagues is unimportant, that contempt for anyone less wealthy than themselves is just fine, and that business judgment does not need to include a personal responsibility for respecting everyone according to their persons and their work.

I asked Ring-Of-Fire about manual jobs, because you don't understand that kind of work until you've dug a quarter-mile line for pipes, or cleared out a septic tank, or taken apart a truck engine and rebuilt a transmission to save the customer the cost of a new one. In the end, it's the hands-on work that matters, and all the managing and direction and strategy is just accessories to the real job. And in this day of intellectual work and projects, there are still tougher jobs - who actually reads the thousands of lines of code to find a simpler syntax, who digs into the audit deep enough to understand the hidden expenses and possible mis-direction of assets, who stays up doing research on a situation to find relavant comparisons and leads to new solutions - than just sitting in a suit and bragging on your investment returns. If ROF works in investment banking, he should be reading up on the new SEC rules regarding Risk Management, he should be reviewing his customer's tolerance for risk and evaluating their portfolios in the new environment, he should be carefully watching the trade of T-bills and major debt instruments in order to accurately project the impact on interest rates this fall. For some reason I don't think he's doing any of that ... it would be too much like work.

ring_of_fire

Character and level of education are highly correlated in my opinion. You guys are focusing on extremes while I'm focusing on what generally happens.

There are such things as "failures" and janitors and custodian represent this well. They never wanted to be janitors or custodians but were forced to due to their poor work ethic. Don't give me an economic excuse since America is a developed country and even poor families have the opportunities to succeed.

Pea

I'm a janitor at home. I can't imagine what our house would look like if I ceased my janitorial functions.