Loads of my friends have good oilfield careers with 2:2 degrees, myself included.
All you needed was a degree to get in, then all that mattered was experience and attitude.

With my 2:1, I'm earning less than half than my mate who's got an HND.
YMMV.

I didn't finish my degree - a summer placement turned into a full time job.

Most of my peers earn no more than I do, and many earn much less, although a couple have done well. The best man at my wedding never attended education beyond sixth form and earns significantly more; and a mate, who left school to join the army and did his twenty, now earns almost double what I do.

In my experience a degree doesn't matter all that much, providing you can string a sentence together and count without removing your socks.

Here, if you have a degree in Spanish, you are pretty much limited to being an interpreter or translator.

The degree defines the area of work you can do. If you do a degree in geography or history, for example, you won't be able to get a job in computing - well you could, but you'd have to start the job at the same level as a school leaver and do a 3 year apprenticeship and go to school 2 days a week for around 400€ a month, until you graduate...

Unlike the guy I had working for me in the UK, had studied geopgraphy, wanted to work in advertising, but as a graduate, he would earn about 3K a year more as a programmer than in an advertising agency, so he applied to work for us. He was totally useless.

Why hadn't he studied marketing or something similar and then taken a job at an agency, to get the experience? Some people just want the money, regardless of their qualifications, skills or aptitude for a specific job. They will turn down jobs in their "specific" area, because they are too low paid to begin with and they want instant gratification, so they don't even consider doing a low level job, that they are qualified for...