So... labor isn't uniform?

> Doubling down on debt and the system with another advanced degree is anti-advice.

Becoming a medical doctor is anti-advice? Is attending Harvard Law or Stanford's CS PhD program also anti-advice? I know this is a tech forum, but jeeze. The lack of appreciation for the world of fulfilling career choices outside pounding out code and managing people who pound out code is a bit concerning.

I guess there's a small population of people who aren't good at school but can self-learn how to program. I agree that for those people a DIY CS degree is good advice.

However, I also think that there's a substantial intersection between people who would get bored doing generic software dev and people who can self-learn CS.

Are you still talking about college here? For a lot of classes, I commonly skipped class and taught myself the topics. In some fields like math that was practically the system even if you attended: Step 1: attend lectures that go too fast and lose you at some point, providing little more than a roadmap to use. Step 2 go home and teach the material to yourself. Step 3 attend exams to quantify how well you did.