If I hadn't attended college when I did I wouldn't have met my wife! That alone is worth every single penny it cost me.
Fortunately I didn't go too far into debt; only about $20K. Still took me awhile to pay it all back which was zero fun the first decade of my career.
I imagine most careers require constant learning of new tools and processes. Heck, in my current line of work as a systems engineer we seem to change the tools we use at least once a year. One could easily make a career out of tool qualification. Learn the ins and outs of some software tool; qualify it using the various industry standards; teach it to others; consult companies on it, rake in oodles of $$. Wait 3 minutes for another tool to come out, rinse and repeat.