Once a bachelor's degree in anything was all you need to be set for life. Then you needed a masters to compete, a Ph.D to distinguish from the oversupply of masters, then whole fields were put into comparisons where people started to use a language that you need a degree in something useful. Multiple degrees became popular and now schools are pushing for life long continuing education. It's like the system is gaining tolerance of formal education as the way people feel good about education now is similar to that of taking narcotics, temporary high to escape reality as with all the time, money, and energy put into education there has been an ever increasing noise about education for the benefits of a degree to be obvious.