Generations ago, college seemed to be mostly:
- a luxury for the scions of wealth, or
- school for preparing for the (relatively few at the time) professions where a specific college degree was necessary or highly useful (e.g. engineering).
For example, in 1960, only 7.7% of 25-29 year old people in the US had bachelor’s degrees. Compare to 34.0% in 2014. https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d14/tables/dt14_104.20.asp