Three Lucrative Careers Without a Degree

While the price of higher education is increasing, a degree is no more a guarantee of employment. Fortunately, there are options. The following are three professions that offer high-income potential with no degree.

Investment Trader
Professional traders buy and sell various financial instruments for example stocks, bonds, commodities or currencies. Independent traders work at home by trading over the internet. New smartphone as well as tablet technologies have given traders additional freedom in order to trade from anywhere. While traditional stocks and bonds require substantial investment finance to trade profitably, other instruments, like foreign foreign currencies, (Forex) can be traded with less than a few hundred dollars.

There is no licensing requirement for private investment traders and there's a wealth of free training available on the web. In addition, market brokers typically offer free demo accounts to help you practice trading without risking any real money.

Who's it for?
People who like to stay present with world news, politics and economics. To be a successful trader you must devote effort and time to learning what drives the markets which you want to trade. Dedicated students of the market can start trading profitably in 3 to six months.

Tax consultant
Professional tax consultants prepare taxes for businesses and people with complicated incomes. Most tax preparers cut their teeth employed by large retail tax preparation chains. These companies offer annual tax-prep courses which qualify you to apply for seasonal employment like a tax-preparer. While these are generally low-paying temporary jobs, they are essential to gaining experience and creating a client-base. Once you have experience, you can branch out by yourself. That's where the real money is.

The IRS has two amounts of qualification for tax professionals; Enrolled Agents and Authorized Preparers. Enrolled Agents (EA's) are the greatest qualified and highest earning. They can prepare taxes independently while Registered Preparers may only prepare taxation statements under the supervision of an EA.

Who could it be for?
People who like to crunch numbers and revel in working with the public. Establishing client relationships is crucial to a successful tax preparation business.

Writer/Publisher
The advent of publishing-on-demand has managed to get possible for anyone to break into the company. Authors can publish their own work with little if any cash investment using services like Lulu and Createspace. On-demand publishing offers much higher royalties per-sale than traditional publishers often pay and most offer enhanced services that will help you market and distribute your titles.

Successful authors concentrate on subjects of wide appeal or which cater to some large niche audience. They also benefit from leveraging social networking, like Facebook, to promote their titles. The best part about self-publishing is it's not necessary to quit your day-job to get started.

Who could it be for?
People who like to write and tend to be good social networkers.