If only 40% of people have a Bachelor's Degree, why does almost everyone I know have one?

It is called selection bias. The United States is very segregated by race and by class.

If you are middle class, you likely went to a middle class high school. You likely had middle class parents with middle class friends (probably mostly of the same race that you are) and you probably spend most of your time in middle class neighborhoods with middle class peers.

People who grow up in poor communities go to poor schools where very few people go to college. They likely have poor parents and they stay in poor neighborhoods and have poor friends.

Of course there is also a very wealthy class that come from wealthy parents. They goe to very expensive schools and hang out with very wealthy friends.

Are you aware that less than 60% of those who pursue a 4 year degree graduate within 6 years?

http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=40

There have been several recent studies which show that class mobility is far less than what people believe that it is, and that it is getting worse.

The Great Recession might change that though, as it appears that almost everyone is going down the food chain. I think it is getting increasingly difficult to stay stuck to the class that we grew up in unless we were part of the top 10%.

Personal story: My dad was a college grad, the first in his family of hard working businessmen, my mom was a farm girl who not only finished HS but did very well with grades. Often times we did not have hardly any money growing up because my dad liked to spend it on himself, and he was a 100% commission paid salesman. But, while we might have looked poorish to some three things pointed to us being of a higher class

1) there were lots of books in the home, and they were used

2) getting good grades was an imperative, poor grades meant that all hell broke lose.

3) we were told that we must be out of the house and self supported at 19 unless we were at university, and that financial success in life was as expected as were good grades.

That actually wasn't entirely correct. According to the study, 40% of white people have Bachelor's Degrees. White people are, financially, better off than people of any other race, and most of the people I was talking about are white.

Yes, what I am saying is entirely correct. If you associated with truly random people than 60% of them would not have bachelors degree (and 40% of them would not be white).

But you don't associate with random people... someone who you know (as you say) is likely to be similar to you (the same race and the same social standing). Someone who grew up in a very poor neighborhood with crappy schools with people who aren't white is very unlikely to meet you (and if you do meet, you are unlikely to hang out with them).

That is the point.

The study counts random people... everybody is equally likely to be counted in the study.

If you only count the people you know... someone who is white and middle class is much more likely to be counted than someone who is black and very poor (or even white and very poor).

I meant that what I said was incorrect. Only 40% of white people have Bachelor's Degrees, yet most of the people I know, who are white, have Bachelor's Degrees.

Yes, the people you know tend to have Bachelor's Degrees because you tend to know people who have Bachelor's degrees. The people you know tend to be White because you tend to know people who are White. Both of these are true at the same time, and not surprising. As the saying goes "birds of a feather flock together".

I think I have answered your question. Shall we move on?

Are you and your friends doing a post graduate degree ?

How many people do you hang out with that are considered poor white trash? How many homeless are you friends with? How many mentally challenged white folks do you associate with?

The school my children attend sounds a lot like yours ... most kids are white..middle to u per middle class...and most kids in my daughters high school go onto to college. She does very well and is in the top 20 percent of her class.

I went to a different school ... very mixed raced...my grades were not as high as hers and I was in the top ten percent of my class and most of the kids did not go onto college.

Just depends on who you know and where you live. Count yourself lucky.

Do most of them graduate college?

Do any of them have degrees in logic or early childhood literacy?

I have never seen stats on that .. although colleges themselves calculate their graduation percentage rate..I don't know if I have ever seen that Stat for a high school . Only how many attend. The town stats for college degrees is about 40 percent .. for four year or more..that would people like me who moved here but did not attend the high school.

That's stats are in my link.

Your link doesn't work

Well it's what I saw.

Was it by town? How was it determined? Since I can't view I can't make a comment. Perhaps my town has an 80% graduation rate -- maybe it has 20% graduation rate?

http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_104.20.asp

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a comma got attached to the link when it was first posted

Engineering graduate - how does it work?
Science graduate - why does it work?
Finance graduate - how much will it cost?
Management graduate - when will it be done?
Liberal Arts graduate - would you like fries with that?