to postpone their 2 YEARS (!) of mandatory military service

I wasn't talking about me ;-)

Sometimes to find a mate.

In my country (Singapore), it is a common way of thinking that having a Bachelor's degree is a must, or else you would never be able to land a good job. However, everyone thinks in this way. So now, since the majority of the younger generation possess a Bachelor's degree, it has turned from being an advantage to being a basic "requirement" – a piece of paper that everyone should have in order to land an average/basic job. The newest advantage has become having a Master's degree. However, I forsee that the Master's degree will have the same plight as the Bachelor's degree, and soon turn into something commonplace. The future new advantage would then become having a PhD.

In Singapore culture, there exists a "scared-to-lose" syndrome, commonly called "kiasu-ism" in Singlish (colloquial Singaporean English). The word "kiasu" comes from a hokkien translation of the chinese words 怕输 (pà shū) which literally means "scared to lose". Someone who is "kiasu" always tries to do/have the ultimate best in order to be at the winning end, often having a selfish sort of attitude while doing so.

Unfortunately, this creates an extremely competitive culture and work environment, causing more and more stress to be placed on studying children and working adults. Also unfortunately, I do not see an end to the exponentially increasing level of "kiasu-ism" in Singapore :( As a result, those who are not instinctively "kiasu" (like me) have no choice but to adopt the "kiasu" syndrome in order to compete with the rest of the population, or at least be on par with them.

So in conclusion, in Singapore, attending college or university becomes a means to success in the workplace. As a Singaporean would say: "No paper, no job."

I think too many school-leavers are pushed into university immediately after school. Two problems come about as a result:

1) The students' experience in a real, working world is postponed for a few more years. At the end of those university years, they still have no experience.

2) There is a glut of university graduates. That is to say, the value of a university degree is reduced.

People go to university to please their future employers that are multinational corporations or administrations. They end up to have to pay for a mortgage that will ruin the next ten years of their life (at least in the U.S.A.).