The internet used to be a place for young people to show off their university education.

The classic graduation gown photo, the almost mandatory “I’ve finished my degree” post or even the initial “Yay! I got in!” announcement.

Now, young people are going online to ask whether a degree is worth the paper it is written on and claim that securing one is a “waste” of time.

Recently a creator on TikTok shared her “unpopular” opinion and said getting a degree isn’t worth what it used to be.

“You can do much better things than wasting 3-5 years of your life,” she argued.

She added that, ultimately, people end up doing jobs unrelated to their degrees and ending up in $40k to $60k debt.

The argument might seem drastic, but young people aren’t embracing university like previous generations. In fact, the number of students studying for bachelor’s degrees has fallen more than 13 per cent since 2016.

Aussie marketer Michelle posted a TikTok where she said that it was so much “harder” for young people to get jobs after university.

“They say when you go to university it is meant to guarantee you a job straight away, but that is not the case at all anymore,” she said.

Michelle even questioned whether pursuing a higher education was worth it if there was no career guarantee at the end.

“What is the point when you can’t even get a job out of it?” she asked.

Creator Shakira Coldwell recently went viral for sharing that after graduating from university, she was unable to find a job.

She said that she has a degree in health but has been unable to get a job because she doesn’t have enough “experience”.

The 21-year-old said it makes her feel like she’s “wasted” her time at university if she cannot secure a job after graduation.

Ms Coldwell did have a positive update a few days later, where she shared that after posting her struggles online, she’d managed to secure employment.

She revealed that the job wasn’t in the field she “studied”, but she was hoping it was a step in the right direction.

“It is kind of like a foot in the door,” she said.

Ms Coldwell’s not alone in her struggle; someone said they were in the exact “same boat”, another said they were still hunting for a job in Brisbane and the experience was “soul-crushing”.

One claimed that university degrees could “barely” get you on the first rung of the career ladder nowadays and another said they now felt university was a “scam” after finishing their degree and a year later not being able to get a job.

Ms Coldwell’s not alone in her plight.

Dixie, who graduated from university, posted on TikTok that she’d studied for four years at university and was now getting turned down for entry-level jobs that don’t even require an education.

Online, people weren’t surprised by Dixie’s predicament; in fact, young people commented to share they were experiencing the same frustrations.

One commented and said they’d been “rejected” from jobs that don’t require experience either, and Dixie replied that it was “frustrating”.

Another responded and said this exact problem was the reason they dropped out of university after only a year and are now deciding whether to do a trade or find a shorter coarse to invest in.

Former international student Sabina uploaded a TikTok, claiming that after spending $36,000 to get her Masters of Business at university in Australia, she now thought it was “useless”.

Are university degrees becoming less relevant?

Head of talent at Employment Hero, Kate Jolly, said while degrees might not lead to immediate success, they are still a “valuable asset”.

Ms Jolly explained that while degrees still have value, it wouldn’t be a deal breaker if a potential candidate didn’t have a degree.

“While a degree is a plus, it’s not the only factor; experience, skills, and a good fit culture matter just as much,” she said.

Jeanette Cheah, founder of HEX, a business that aims to help people upskill in their careers, said she’s seeing a trend of employers being less hung-up on prospective employees having degrees.

“What we’re seeing is that while degrees are still the highest ‘signal’ of education, there’s more and more evidence employers are willing to hire talent straight out of high school and put them through on-the-job training, rather than wait for them to complete a degree,” she said.

She added the trend wasn’t just happening in “professional” careers but in all types of professions.

“This is happening in professional services as well as in other sectors like engineering, trades and in tech. Employers like Google have come out to say that they consider their own 6-month courses as the equivalent of a full degree when they’re hiring,” she said.