I might be the youngest person on this forum as I am not even a millennial, I am 19 years old and I am Gen Z. I can confirm that all of this is true. The main problem is that I want to be a catholic religion teacher. I don't know what I should do with this as the debt that comes in will be crazy. The average student loan debt has hit $50,000. I might need some advice.
Where would you want to teach Catholic religion?
Unfortunately, part of the scam is that it's difficult to get a job, especially in teaching, without that "degree". So if you want a job in teaching, there aren't many alternatives except to take a lot of classes at a Community College and transfer them over. For those who live in Ohio, they have a program called "College Credit Plus," where you can take college classes for dual credit, both towards eventual college and for High School, and the state pays for it (by moving money from High School to the college). Also, even places like McDonalds, Taco Bell, and Chipotle pay good chunks of college tuition if you work a minimum number of hours per week (I think it was 18 for McDonald's). So if you work 18 hours, you get up to $3500 per year towards college.
For some fields, you can probably sneak in without a degree by just taking the classes you need in your MAJOR field of study. So, for instance, if you wanted to get into Computer Science, you could take the 8-10 classes required for a Major and then tell prospective employers that you completed the course requirements but haven't yet been able to fill out the core curriculum.
I got into Computer Science myself, despite only having degrees in Greek and Latin, because i learned the stuff myself, and employers simply didn't look past the fact that I had a degree. All I listed on my resume was, "A.B., Loyola University of Chicago". I didn't list my major. And you'd be surprised how few people ask.
Of course, NOBODY actually checks your college reference. I could have told them that I had a B.S. from Princeton, and it's not like anyone has ever bothered to check. OF COURSE, for Traditional Catholics, that's lying. These guys come over from India and claim they have degrees from the University of Bangalore or something, and who the heck is going to call over there to find out if "Vishal Reddy" has a degree there? Answer: "Yes, we have about 3,000 of them." Good luck. Of, in my case, I could say I had a Master's from the University of Budapest, and nobody would ever check.
BTW, I would be leary of Indian medical professionals who claim to have degrees for the same reason.