My goodness, I can't believe I actually need to elaborate on this to a supposedly straight A student. You've totally missed the point. Where on earth did you get the idea I was alluding to nonsense like "feel good platitudes, the glories of education and the unparalleled benefits a great mind"?

The vast majority of Singaporeans would want to make big money and treat pay as the primary career goal. You are making this sound like you've got some unique perspective buttressed with an honest and blunt style. Give me a break - that's about as typical Singaporean on the street as you can get.

By immaturity of cognition, I am referring to your simplistic notion of tying up future pay to the course of study and somehow thinking you can calculate ROI for each course and thereby choose the course with the highest ROI. And seriously asking this sort of broad and generic question on an online forum?

The type of degree one studies is just one of the many contributing factors to long term pay. On an individual level, there are many other career elements, some within while others outside your control, that ultimately determine your lifetime earnings. Most people also do not experience linear pay growth, there are ups and downs, long periods of stagnation etc. over the years all subjected to vagaries of life.

Grow up dude.