Abbie May has a business degree but said she doesn’t use it in her current or previous marketing jobs. (Source: Instagram\/Abbie May) <\/p>\n
An Australian business owner has shared why she regrets going to university<\/a> as she is hit with an \u201cinsane\u201d HECS debt bill every tax time. Millions of Australians will have seen their student debts cut by 20 per cent<\/a> by next week and while it\u2019ll be welcome relief, many are still questioning whether their debt was worth it<\/a>.<\/p>\n Abbie May graduated with a Bachelor of Business majoring in marketing and HR in 2020, along with a HECS debt<\/a> of around $38,000. The Gold Coast woman told Yahoo Finance she “absolutely regrets\u201d her university degree<\/a> and has found she hasn\u2019t actually used anything she learned in her professional life.<\/p>\n \u201cI think I would have saved myself a lot of money and a lot of time by skipping the degree and just going to do an internship for a year,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n RELATED<\/p>\n May started her own marketing agency in January and has been employed in marketing roles for the last five years.<\/p>\n She was very academic at school and got a 96 ATAR. But she felt like she was \u201cpushed into uni\u201d after graduating and was told not to \u201cwaste\u201d her Year 12 result.<\/p>\n \u201cAt the time, that seemed like the right thing to do. But now, being in the creative field that I\u2019m in, I was employed for five years at an agency but they never asked me to see a Bachelor\u2019s degree or anything like that. So it\u2019s not like I ever needed my degree,\u201d May said.<\/p>\n \u201cI was also in the Covid block for uni, so I think there\u2019s obviously a huge effect that had on me because of Covid it was all online.<\/p>\n \u201cSo I feel like I\u2019ve got a $38,000 HECS debt<\/a>, it\u2019s not that big anymore, but that\u2019s what it was when I first finished my degree, to essentially just do a glorified online course.\u201d<\/p>\n Do you have a story to share? Contact tamika.seeto@yahooinc.com<\/a><\/p>\n May said it was hard for business degrees to keep up with the creative space and how fast-changing the world of social media has become.<\/p>\n It took her four years to complete her degree, as she worked while studying at McDonald’s and later at a gym.<\/p>\n Australians have now started receiving text messages and emails from the Australian Taxation Office (ATO)<\/a> advising them their HECS debt has been slashed.<\/p>\n About three million Australians will see their debts cut by 20 per cent<\/a>, backdated to June 1. Around 1.5 million Australians have had their debt cut already, while the remaining 1.5 million will have it cut by next Thursday.<\/p>\n Story Continues <\/p>\n Someone with the average student debt of $27,000 will see their debt lowered by $5,500. In total, $16 billion in student loans will be wiped.<\/p>\n May said she was looking forward to receiving the 20 per cent reduction. Her HECS debt<\/a> is currently sitting at around $10,000 after years of working, with her repayments still a large amount each year.<\/p>\n Last financial year, for example, she had to make nearly $8,000 in HECS debt repayments at tax time.<\/p>\n \u201cNow that I\u2019m a sole trader, moving into a company, it\u2019s taking still a huge toll out of my tax each year. That\u2019s where it really comes to burn because I\u2019m like, god, I\u2019m still paying for this thing that I don\u2019t know if I\u2019ve ever referred back to anything,\u201d she told Yahoo Finance.<\/p>\n May said her HECS debt was also a bit of a \u201cticking time bomb\u201d when it came to wanting to take out a mortgage in the future.<\/p>\n \u201cIt feels like it kind of just pushes those goals further down the line as well,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n May said her message wasn\u2019t for people not to go to university. Rather, she would like to see more education around the different pathways available to people<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThe education around your pathways when you\u2019re at that age definitely push you down this agenda of staying in the schooling system. There\u2019s not enough options, not enough people preaching this message of there\u2019s so many other career pathways for you,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n While some jobs will require a university degree, like if you want to become a lawyer or a doctor, May said she didn\u2019t believe a business degree was necessary for creative fields, social media or people wanting to go down the entrepreneurial path.<\/p>\n May said she was passionate abot internship programs and believes this can offer people a lot more experience, knowledge and skills than a degree.<\/p>\n She added that she still invests in courses to upskill, but these are between $3,000 and $5,000 each and she’s also found they are more relevant than her uni degree.<\/p>\n \u201cHow much time did I waste doing that as well? Is really what I think about. I was showing up and doing all these uni online courses and really it was just old traditional methods which didn’t kind of meet what I’m doing now anyway,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n May also believes taking a gap year<\/a> can be helpful instead of diving straight into university and can give you time to figure out what you want to do.<\/p>\n Get the latest Yahoo Finance news – follow us on Facebook<\/a>, LinkedIn<\/a> and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n May has her own marketing agency, Better Collective, and worked in agencies after she finished uni. (Source: Instagram\/Better Collective\/Abbie May) <\/p>\n