Better Pay for cosmetologists and barbers

We spend $14,000.00 to $25,000.00 to go to college for our education. We currently make minimum wage and 85% of us can't pay our bills, buy food or feed our children or even afford health care under the new affordable care act. It's sad that a 16 year old still in high school can get a part-time job making $.50 - $1.00 more an hour than we do. We work full- time and make roughly $600-$700 monthly that is $15,600 - $18,200 yearly. At these rates we can't afford to live let alone pay back our student loans. Some of us are so far in debt that we need to declare bankruptcy, however bankruptcy doesn't help with our student loans they are still there, they do not go away. So if not being able to pay our student loans and purchase just the basic needs to live and we declare bankruptcy when we come out of bankruptcy we are in fact still in the same sticky situation. Is it right for us to spend this money on education and be paid less than someone who is still in high school? We think it is unfair and we are demanding that this be re-evaluated.