Frankly, I don't think a college degree means much these days.     

Why do you say that?  

There are too many college graduates and not enough jobs for them. It's better to learn a trade like carpentry or bricklaying.  

But a college education gives a man prestige. And he can make more money.  

Oh, Dad! That's the trouble with your generation. All you care about is material things. We care about happiness!  

GLOSSARY

I don't think (that) a college degree... Again the optional conjunction that is omitted, as it usually is in such sentences in informal speech.

These days = at the present time.

Bricklaying is a compound noun (noun + verbal, rather than noun + noun) with the normal stress for such words: the stronger stress on the first element.

Make ... money = earn money.

CULTURAL BACKGROUND

One of the effects of expanded opportunities for a college education has been an oversupply of college graduates in the work force. So, in a sense, a college degree has come to mean no more than a high-school diploma meant in the early 1900s. Many young people today, disillusioned with this situation, are seeking alternatives to college. Dad represents a generation in which a college degree was far more impressive than it is today, and conferred more prestige on its possessor. But the children are wrong to suppose that Dad, too, is not concerned with happiness. The generation gap works both ways!

Source: English Teaching Forum - Author: Julia Dobson

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