Price tag for the American dream: $130K a year

[SheilaT]

107. Those tests aren't perfect, but I certainly found them very helpful.

There is also a real limit to how early it is realistic to start on your career. A young child rarely is focused on the same thing they'll be doing as an adult, with dance being one of the major exceptions.

It's why most kids change majors at least once in college. I think it is helpful that some high schools have started various career focus things for the kids. Even with that, I keep on meeting people who got all the way through college quite successfully and then when they started working in their field discovered the simply did not like it that much.

You are absolutely right that you need to know where you are going, and too many college kids do just drift. I spent all four years that my younger son was in college telling him to please go to their Career Center and discuss job prospects and internships with them, but could never get him to do it. And the career centers all say that their biggest problem is that so few students ever come to them. Which means, as you've correctly pointed out, the person who is ahead of the game should do much better.

It's just that I don't think most people at a very young age can actually make a sensible decision about what they're going to be doing fifteen or more years down the road. Heck, most of us how are at least that far into our working lives are doing something quite different from anything we ever thought we'd do.