Until about five minutes ago, I was not aware that only 24.4 percent of Americans have a college degree or higher. 3 percent of Americans have professional or doctorate degrees.

The numbers are definitely a lot lower than I had expected, so I checked the stats for California and found that we only deviate from the national average by about 3 percentage points.

It sounds so sheltered, but I guess I've always operated under the assumption that everyone who wants to graduate from college, could do so. The statistics, however, seem to paint a different picture.