(NYTIMES) Ms Shanna Jackson, president of Nashville State Community College, is struggling with a dilemma that reads like good news: Her students are taking jobs from employers who are eager to hire and paying them good wages.

The problem is that students often drop their plans to earn a degree in order to take the attractive positions offered by these desperate employers. She is worried that when the labour market cools - a near certainty as the US Federal Reserve Board raises interest rates, slowing the economy in an attempt to control rapid inflation - an incomplete education will come back to haunt these students.