What I found shocking was the implicit assumption that the only reason to go to college was financial.
I've pondered that, for this time (and for that matter, I have a little time to try to post about it), and I have to wonder if they included in their assessments the value of the connections you acquire, the friendships you build, and the innate value of the knowledge you've gained in a college environment.
My own observations, admittedly non-scientific, suggest that people with a college education are completely different than they were exiting high school.
Was that just natural maturation, that would have occurred even without college? I can't say. But in conversation with such people, they make associations and connections that might not be as likely had they not the additional years of learning.
In my own background, knowledge is held in high esteem for its own sake. Perhaps that's not as true in other cultures, such as the one of the man who'd been interviewed on NPR...